


Dolorem et Consolationem

by royalreddeath



Series: D&C [1]
Category: Kingdom Hearts
Genre: Found Family, Haunting of the Past, Healing, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Pictures, Sparring, Suicidal Thoughts, Surprises, kh3
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-07
Updated: 2019-08-03
Packaged: 2019-11-13 05:34:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 18
Words: 33,248
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18025676
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/royalreddeath/pseuds/royalreddeath
Summary: This work is a Post-KH3 fic that focuses on Lea and Isa, but will dip into everyone else who is healing alongside them. Not all chapters will be as heavy as the first or as light as the second.Skip first chapter to avoid suicidal thoughts.Updates every Saturday.





	1. Chapter 1

Snapping your fingers was a simple action and doing that action shouldn’t send anyone into emotional shutdown. It shouldn’t make someone stand in the middle of their kitchen, having just remembered what they were looking for at three in the morning, and suddenly be staring at their hands in horror. 

The sound of snapping wasn’t normally an issue, despite the terrible things that occurred with the snap of someone else’s fingers over the course of twelve years. Lea felt his heart beating quickly, as if it were trying once more to break free of his chest. A shaking hand clutched at it, hoping to keep himself whole even while his throat felt tight and his breathing got sharp. He was okay. He was fine. Nobody was getting hurt. He wasn’t hurting people. 

Free hand went to the counter, leaning on it to keep himself steady, Lea felt tears welling up in his eyes. Lea felt too much, momentary wish to have his feelings taken away left him feeling more hollow and gutted than he had without a heart. What kind of person was he, wanting that back? Everything that other people had sacrificed for him to be back again. He killed people, he… killed people, he didn’t deserve his heart back anyways.

He sank to the ground and continued to clutch his chest. Too many thoughts were flying through his mind. Guilt, regret, pain, hatred. He wanted to dig his heart out of his chest again. The thought he’d yelled at himself for having returned with even greater force.

He could do it, he could just… A flick of the wrist and his fingers closed around the handle he rarely actually used. He stared at the blade, heart still beating out of his chest and breathing still not steady. The thing that was a total joke, the thing that got shattered into a million pieces in front of him. The thing that would help him feel better, even if it was only temporary. His own death meant very little to him when he’d died three times already. 

He could come back again. He’d be enough of himself to get himself back if necessary. 

He wondered briefly if he’d be able to use his keyblade as a nobody. Then he wondered if he was strong enough to even be a nobody again. Lea’s hand shook as he held his keyblade out, away from his body. He’d killed or caused the deaths of multiple people who he blamed for the first blade that pierced his chest. 

His other hand began to reach for the handle. He wasn’t thinking clearly enough, but he didn’t want to die. He just wanted to stop… feeling. Maybe part of why he’d instructed Kairi to call him Axel was because he wanted to be again. Yeah, that sounded right. Why would he think that if it wasn’t true? 

Both hands gripped the keyblade’s handle.

Then his hands were pushed down, blade being carefully held by the hands pushing his down.

“Lea? Lea, look at me. Let go.” The familiar voice only made Lea’s vision swim as the tears that filled his eyes finally had the pressure keeping them back released. So, again, the voice spoke. “Whatever you were thinking of doing with that’s not any kind of answer.”

The blade vanished and Lea’s hands fell to his lap. Breathing had gotten steadier as he’d held his blade, but with the tears running down his face, it was ragged. He was pulled into an embrace.

“I know, Lea. I know,” Isa’s voice was gentle, like it had been when they were children. “I brought your eyeliner in case this was what was happening. Let me know when you can breathe enough to lay down.”

Lea managed to process the words after a few tries and nodded. 

The next few minutes felt choked. Sobs came from Lea as Isa sat, stone-faced and holding his best friend. As Lea’s crying began to lessen, Isa gently began to run his fingers through his hair. 

After a few gentle moments with Isa stroking his hair, Lea brought his arms up to hold Isa back. He felt awful, worrying Isa like that, but he knew he should be grateful. He might not have done it, but being alone after almost doing it would’ve been worse than escaping his problems and dying.

“Why are you up, Isa?” Lea’s voice was rough, crying ruined the usual upbeat and sarcastic tone of his.

“I woke up, probably from you moving the bed to get up, and you weren’t there. It felt like something was wrong. I was right, as I usually am,” Isa said calmly while still brushing his fingers through Lea’s hair. His hand gave away more than his words or voice ever would. Despite the motions being a clean cycle, they weren’t incredibly fluid. Lea could feel his hair being pulled on because Isa’s hand had taken his shake.

“... Sorry you found me like that, Isa.”

“Just don’t do it again. Come get me instead.” Lea was wrong, Isa’s voice broke slightly as he spoke. “Want to talk about what got you tonight?”

“Not really.” Lea moved back to look at Isa and swallowed, testing his throat before he spoke again, “Are you okay?”

“I brought the eyeliner.”

“That’s not an answer, Isa.”

“I brought what you need. Come lay on my lap so I can draw them on.”

“You don’t need to.”

“You were going to kill yourself, Lea.” Isa’s voice was fully saturated with emotion. Tears were in both of their eyes as they sat on the kitchen floor in the dead of night. “You looked like you were ready to kill yourself. Leave me with your fading body. Have to see my best friend… dead. Lay on my lap and stop talking.”

Lea wiped at his face, drying what he thought was left of the tears and leading away a few new ones. He turned himself around and laid backwards, resting his head on Isa’s lap like he had done so many years ago. 

“I wasn’t thinking,” Lea said softly as Isa uncapped the eyeliner, checking how blunt the pencil was before bringing his hand down to begin drawing the tears.

“I doubt that’s true, but I understand.”

Silence fell over the kitchen as Isa filled in the outline of the teardrops. Even the gentle touch of the side of Isa’s hands on his cheek felt heavy, despite the deeply comforting position they were in.

“I’m sorry.”

“I already told you, I get it. Don’t talk about it.”

It wasn’t a request anymore, it was closer to a command. Or was it just a plead? Either way, Lea nodded.

And got a gentle tap on his head as Isa moved the pencil away. “Way to mess the tears up, Lea.”

“Huh? Oh, sorry. Did that really fuck them up?”

“Nah, but if you keep moving, you’ll waste your stupidly expensive eyeliner.”

Lea sighed and looked up, locking eyes with Isa for a moment. “I’m done moving now, you can keep drawing on me.”

“Okay. Thank you.” Isa gently hit Lea’s nose with the pencil and moved to the other cheek to carefully draw the outline. 

“I’m sorry for making you see me like that. I’d understand if you’re mad at me.”

“What?” Isa froze, hit by Lea’s sudden words. Resuming the topic hadn’t been expected. “Mad?”

“Yeah. I’d be mad.”

“You’d be mad if you walked in on me… contemplating…” Isa took in a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Would you really be mad if it were me?”

“... No, I guess not.”

“Then why would I be mad at you?”

“I…”

“You don’t know because that’s stupid. I knew you were an idiot, but I didn’t know it was that bad.” Somehow, even through calling Lea an idiot, Isa’s voice was soft and comforting. Scared too. “Just don’t leave me like that and I won’t be mad, alright?”

“I’ll try my best.”

“Want to tell me what made you do that?” Isa resumed drawing the second tear onto Lea’s face.

“I killed people. I snapped and suddenly people who I’d known for years were dead. I know why I did that… I know it worked out… I know he wasn’t exactly the most morally upstanding person before Xehanort… but I killed him. And Zexion. Ienzo was a kid, Isa.”

“I know. I’m sorry I made you do that.”

“It’s worse that they’re not mad at me now.”

“They both wish nothing more than to atone for their actions. They know. Even without knowing our plan to find her and… everyone else they hurt… they know we had our reasons.”

“But-...”

“I know, Lea. You’re too good for what Axel was.” Isa moved the pencil away and leaned down to kiss Lea’s forehead. “I’m sorry for pushing you to be worse than just empty. It all feels like it was almost for nothing and I know that. Everyone knows you apologize every other sentence to anyone you might have hurt as Axel. You’re better than anyone deserves.”

Lea sighed and reached to hold Isa’s free hand, twisting his arm a bit to do so. “Can we be done?”

“Of course.”

“Okay… You know you deserve good, right?”

“Yes, I know.”

“I don’t believe you, but alright.” 

Isa leaned back and looked at Lea’s face, sighing and placing the eyeliner pencil on the bridge of Lea’s nose. “I’m done. You’ve got your lucky charms and nothing’s gonna hurt you, not even yourself.”

Lea took a moment to focus on keeping still so the pencil would stay balanced on his nose before responding to Isa, “I love you.”

Isa modded and leaned down to kiss Lea’s forehead again, accidentally knocking the pencil from Lea’s nose. “I know. I love you too…” Isa paused and leaned back again before tapping the side of Lea’s head, smiling with what looked like tears in his eyes. “Got it memorized?”


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Focusing heavily on the comfort side of everything, Lea and Xion get Isa a surprise gift.

“Isa, I need your help,” a hurried tone came from Lea as he grabbed at Isa’s hand, looking at his best friend with pleading eyes.

“What’s wrong?”

“I lost our baby.”

“Our… baby? What are you talking about?” Isa looked around, confused. Having a child with Lea, that wasn’t in the plans… or the past. His confusion was easily displayed for Lea to enjoy on his face. It hadn’t been too many days before that Lea had broken down, Lea’s anxiety-filled voice worried Isa. “We don’t have a baby?”

“Stop trying to figure out what I’m talking and just help me look.”

“For what?”

“Xion.”

Isa had a visible moment of understanding that was replaced quickly by confusion again. Lea was being too visibly stressed and the man was a bad liar. “Ah, is she our baby now? I wasn’t aware of that.”

“No, she stole our baby.”

“What?”

“Just help me look for her, Isa. I’ll explain when we find Xion.”

“Would Roxas know where she is?”

“Dunno, haven’t texted him yet. You could try if you want to?” There was a moment where Lea’s distress he’d forced into his voice faded, but he knew all too well that Isa was easy to pull along. Lea just had to sound genuinely worried about something for a few moments and Isa would want to make sure everything was okay.

It made him feel like a teenager again to use that knowledge, but it was for a good cause. Isa would forgive him.

That was all if he was even mad at all once they got where they were going. Lea doubted Isa would be able to look at what he’d left with Xion and be mad for even a second.

Isa let Lea drag him along while he attempted to call Roxas, getting no response either time he dialed the teen’s number on the phone. 

“Is Roxas alright, he’s not picking up?”

“He might be hanging out with his other friends? Y’know, because Xion and I don’t get jealous over Roxas not hanging out with us and only us?”

“This is why I don’t tell you things, Lea. You were worried about this a second ago, can you get serious or tell me what’s going on?”

“That sounds like I don’t have any fun option. Just trust me, okay? I’ll get slightly serious and say this isn’t life or death or anything I’m worried about, but you gotta hurry up. Pretend it is. Pretend you’re not being so boring about this.”

“You worried me on purpose, Lea. That’s not… You can’t do that to me.” 

Genuine distress seemed to radiate from Isa and Lea suddenly felt horrible. He reached for Isa’s face, pushing some hair out of his eyes then cupping his cheek. “Sorry, I wasn’t thinking. I just wanted you to come with me. Should know better than to mess with you like that.”

As an immediate response to Lea’s words, Isa snorted. “I’m not actually hurt. You should know when I’m messing with you after all these years, Lea.”

Lea’s expression flattened as he looked at his best friend, his boyfriend, the man he was living with and in love with. He seriously wondered if it was worth it. Thinking about the fact that he had just gotten called out about messing with Isa’s emotions… didn’t matter, Isa was still the worst. 

He pulled out his gummiphone and flipped through it to find Xion’s number, ignoring the smug look on Isa’s face as Lea sulked. Video calls were easy to do on the phone, which was good because he wanted Isa to hear the conversation.

“Xion?”

“Is something wrong, Lea?”

“Yeah, Isa’s being a douchebag, so you can keep what you’re watching.”

“No, that’s mean to me and Isa.”

“… Yeah, I guess it is. Anyways, uh. You’re still hanging around Radiant Garden with the gift, right? Since Isa was a party-pooper… ”

“I was worried,” Isa interrupted with a roll of his eyes.

“Since Isa was a party-pooper,” Lea continued with a huff, sticking his tongue out at Isa then looking back to his phone with a fond smile. “Could you just tell us where you hid out?”

Xion giggled. “You’re funny, Lea. I’m by the fountains? I thought they were pretty and nice to wait by.”

“Alright, thanks. See you soon, that’s not the direction I started going in.”

“Bye, Lea! Isa!”

“See you soon, Xion,” Isa said, placing his hand on Lea’s shoulder and bringing himself into the view of the phone’s camera. It was always nice to receive a reminder from Isa that he really did love that girl now that he saw her as a person and not some kind of doll. The call ended with a happy wave from Xion, her eyes widening as she quickly turned off the phone mid-run.

“Well, let’s get going.”

“Lea, what was she running at? There’s nothing here that’s shock-worthy anymore. The heartless problem has all but disappeared and Xion wouldn’t be…”

Lea just sighed and shook his head, placing his hand on the one Isa had placed on his shoulder, gently bringing it down and keeping a hold on it. “Don’t bother trying to guess, you might get it eventually, but it’ll still be a good surprise. So just come with me, okay?”

Not thinking about things didn’t seem right to Isa at this point, he was always thinking. It was a constant need for years. Not to mention it was just how he was, but it was Lea asking. “Fine. I’ll stop thinking about the surprise. I’ll just think about how much I need to kick your ass for trying to scare me into running around the town looking for something with you.”

“I wanted to have a dorky adventure with you.”

“Then ask next time. I’ve been joking about being mad, but, seriously, Lea. You can’t scare me into doing things. You’re stupid, but I thought you were smart about it.”

“I’m stupid?”

“Lea.”

“Okay. I’m sorry, Isa.” Squeezing Isa’s hand, Lea started to tug him towards the fountains. Discussion wasn’t something they both wanted to do at the same time, things never lined up in a way that worked out well for both of them at the same time. The last serious discussion they’d had was on their kitchen floor together in the dead of night and Lea still wasn’t ready to talk again.

They didn’t even get to the fountains before they heard Xion’s voice, laughing and calling out for someone to stop drinking the fountain water. Isa paused and looked at Lea, eyebrows scrunched together as he tried to figure out what was going on yet again.

Then it seemed to click all together in Isa’s mind.

“Lea, did you-?”

Lea cut Isa off quickly by putting a hand on his mouth, much to Isa’s immense displeasure. Before Lea could get out the words he was planning on saying, Isa licked Lea’s hand in retaliation. 

Lea immediately pulled his hand back and wiped it on his pants. “Eugh, Isa, gross.”

“Don’t put your hand on my mouth.”

“Don’t lick me!”

“I’ll keep that in mind la-”

Again, Isa was cut off. “Isa!”

“You said no licking you, I was just saying I’d remember you said that. I have no idea what you’re so offended by, Lea.” Isa shrugged before he continued to walk towards the fountains without Lea, a speed to his walk that rarely ever happened. He was excited. Lea was happy.

They found Xion kneeling over, giggling with her feet in the water, moving from side to side as she tried to hold something small and active. There was a small bark from her arms as she stood up and turned around.

And a small puppy was wiggling in her arms, trying to get free.

“Oh, hi, Isa. Lea said to keep the puppy hidden, but he was too… puppy-like?” Xion smiled sheepishly at Lea as he walked up, sad that she hadn’t been able to do what was asked of her. 

Lea, naturally, just smiled at her and ruffled her hair as Isa walked over to inspect the puppy with a small smile on his face. It had been quite some time since Lea had seen Isa look so soft and happy with anyone else in the area. 

“May I?” Isa asked, reaching a hand out towards the dog.

Xion looked up and smiled again, nodding. “Of course. Lea and I got this puppy for you! See, he’s got little angry eyebrows. Lea thought it was funny… because he’s super sweet, but looks mad all the time?”

“Ah, like me. I see.” Isa glanced at Lea and rolled his eyes, looking back to the dog with the soft look back on his face immediately after looking back at the dog. He gently took the small, wiggly puppy into his arms. “Does he have a name yet?”

“Not a good one. You should name him, he’s small enough it wouldn’t be bad to rename him,” Lea said, moving to stand next to Xion so he could face Isa and put a hand on the small girl’s shoulder. He looked like a proud bird, puffed up and stupidly fluffy, ready to say some nonsense to amuse everyone in the area.

“Balsam,” Isa said in a calm, sure voice while looking down at the puppy in his arms.

“Like the salad dressing?”

“No, Lea. Why would I name a dog after salad?”

“It’s like the moon, right?” Xion wasn’t entirely sure about her answer, but the moon was almost familiar to her now. She knew some of what Isa knew from when she copied his abilities. “The… thin one? That you have on your pin?”

Isa smiled and nodded, his smile a proud one. She knew about the moon. “Yes, it’s a moon of rest and restoration. I think it’s what we all need.”

Lea rubbed at the back of his head. “Sorry for not being a huge moon nerd. My next guess was a kind of tree.”

“And you say knowing the moon makes a nerd. That’s not even a type of tree that grows in this world, Lea.” Isa laughed at 

“I think that’s a really good name, Isa.” Xion spoke while reaching up to pet the dog, bringing attention back to where it should be. “He’s very soft, I hope you like him as much as Lea said you would. He said you’ve always liked dogs.”

“I have. Don’t let him fool you, though, he’s got the softer spot for any animal. His parents were nice people, but even they got tired of him and his animals.”

“That’s only because I brought home a snake once. Dad didn’t like that one. I think I snuck that one into school since I couldn’t keep it at home…”

Xion covered her mouth, eyes closing as she laughed. “You two are so funny.”

“Oh yeah? You really think so? How ‘bout the time Isa named a dog we found ‘Stinky’?”

Xion looked at Isa with a small gasp, as if offended for this poor dog’s dignity.

Isa just sighed. “I did not name the dog Stinky, Lea. I said that as a joke and you wouldn’t let it go. I never once called him Stinky, even when I was saying he was smelly.”

“Lea, that means you named the poor dog Stinky. That’s awful.” Xion crossed her arms and wiggled her shoulders to get Lea’s hand off so she could look properly grumpy at him. She started to giggle as soon as she looked up at her tall friend, quickly breaking the act.

“You sound just like Isa. He kept saying it was awful too.”

“See, Xion? I tried my best to keep the dog’s dignity. He was already a stray then Lea names him Stinky. Horrible.”

“I’m glad Lea wasn’t in charge of naming me.”

“No, I’m very unsure where your name came from. I’ve neglected to ask Even if he’d know since I don’t… enjoy being in the labs.”

“I just knew it one day. Xion is me, even when I wasn’t my own person.”

Lea and Isa’s expressions both dropped and they stood there silently for a moment, unsure what to say. The silence was broken by the small puppy with the angry eyebrows barking.

Xion looked at both adults and their worried expressions and smiled. “It’s okay. I am now. And maybe I used to be too, but not before I knew my name.”

Isa nodded and carefully handed the puppy to Lea so he could place a hand on Xion’s shoulder. They’d discussed things that had happened when he was Saïx before, but Isa still touched her like he’d break her in half with the slightest amount of pressure. He spoke to her like he was walking on eggshells. While he knew neither of them liked nor appreciated this, he was worried. “Based on what I’ve been told, you may have been your own person since your body was given and semblance of a heart.”

Xion looked at his hand on her shoulder, feeling the awkward air. “It’s okay, Isa… I know what I was and I accepted that.”

“It was a lot, what you were put through. More than any child should have to face.”

“I…”

“Got me a dog with Lea. Yes, thank you,” Isa said with a nod, already unsure of what else to say, especially while Lea was there. 

Xion responded by letting out a breath then smiling. “Yeah. Balsam’s a way better name than snowy. He’s way too dark to be named Snowy.”

“The… dog was named Snowy? That’s a… very cute name.”

Lea laughed and handed the dog back to Isa. “Yeah, well, I thought it sucked. And you already have Balsam locked in, dontcha?”

“Yes, Lea, I do. It’s a better name.” Isa looked down at the puppy. “Did you get a harness? A leash? Have you just been letting him run around by the fountains?”

Xion and Lea looked at each other, Xion genuinely confused by the question. Did dogs need things like that? Why hadn’t Lea gotten things the dog needed? 

Lea laughed and rubbed at the back of his head. “Well, y’see, I didn’t think about that when I got the dog. Nobody’s walking around with dogs on leashes.”

“Yes, but this is a puppy. Do you want him to get lost, Lea?”

“No.”

“Xion, would you like to see what a puppy actually needs? Alongside the toys I’m sure Lea purchased that are for much older dogs.”

“Oh, okay. Do you know where they put in a pet store?” Xion asked, excited to have something that she could do with Isa that wasn’t going to be saturated by the guilt and frustration Isa felt towards his actions towards Xion. It was easy to see in her bright eyes. Lea could’ve sworn they were getting slightly greener.

“No, I don’t. Please, lead the way.” Isa looked to Lea. “Are you coming? You apparently need to learn how to actually take care of a puppy, stray or not.”


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Short and stupid. Sometimes waking up at 3 in the morning isn't THAT bad.

“Your dog needs to pee, Lea,” Isa grumbled, shoving at Lea as the puppy whined at the foot of their bed. The dog was partially housebroken, but if they didn’t get up in time, all bets were off. They were both exhausted. This dog had far too much energy for them even if they loved him.

“Got him for you, he’s your dog,” Lea mumbled back, not fully awake and a little delirious. 

“You picked him out, puppies have small bladders, your fault,” Isa’s tone was more annoyed than it had been in years, but Lea wasn’t going to be swayed by it so easily. He couldn’t quite tell it was that annoyed, exhaustion kept fear away. A person can’t fear the wrath of god when they’re too tired to comprehend there’s a god.

So the exhausted man simply rolled over and closed his eyes again.

The wrong choice.

Isa sat up, his own exhaustion rolling off of him in waves. If Lea had been even slightly more awake, he would’ve realized getting up was the best option here. Isa had taken the dog out twice that night already, doing it a third time was going to kill Lea.

“Lea. The person who got the dog should take him out at least once tonight.”

“Xion’s sleeping at Olette’s again.”

“Then that sounds like it’s a problem for you,” Isa said as he swung his legs out of bed, causing the jumping and barking to increase. The dog was quickly scooped up and gently, for the puppy’s sake, dropped directly onto Lea’s head.

The scramble that happened immediately afterwards would make Isa laugh later, but for now his face was as stone cold as Saïx’s had been for so many years. Lack of sleep had eaten up his ability to feel bad about dropping a dog on Lea’s head to get him to get up, but it also ate up his ability to be amused at the flailing of stupidly long limbs. Arms shot up to try to figure out what was happening and as the dog’s little feet dug into Lea’s cheeks and pulled at his hair, legs kicked out from under the blankets.

“Okay, okay, okay! I get it! I’ll get up!” 

Isa stood, arms crossed over his chest. He looked as if he’d committed his final hit on a long, personally written hit list. Exhausted, remorseless, and with a slight hint of feeling emptiness from the victory.

Luckily, he didn’t care about this emptiness. It was too obviously one that would go away once he got some fucking sleep.

“The harness is hanging up by the door with his leash. I’m not sure if you know or not.”

“I do, I take him out all the time. Stop being so grumpy, asshole.”

“Nah.” With that, Isa slid back into bed and pulled the blankets over himself. “I’ll see you in the morning.”

“Yeah.”

“You’re lucky I love you.”

“Me? I’m lucky?”

“Yeah,” Isa mumbled, already drifting back off to sleep.

Lea rolled his eyes and huffed, watching the dog bounce at his feet for a few moments before he sighed. A smile replaced the scowl. “Yeah, alright. I got it, I gotta do something first.”

The dog obviously had no idea what Lea was saying, so he just excitedly bounced around the man’s feet while he walked over to Isa’s side of the bed and kissed Isa’s head. “You better not be going to sleep angry at me.”

“I will if you keep me up,” Isa grumbled, reaching up to pat at Lea’s head. “I’ll love you in the morning.”

“You okay with me loving you now?”

“Yeah, just be quiet about it. G’night…”

Lea laughed, fully awake from having a dog dropped on his head. Unpleasant, but it was fine. This was a kind of grumpy from Isa he could handle and love.


	4. Chapter 4

Being petty was nothing but commonplace in Lea’s relationship with Isa and maybe it was childish to spend hours trying to figure out how to get back at his best friend for dropping a dog on his face, but- 

No, Lea thought to himself. No, Isa dropped a husky puppy on his face. This couldn’t be considered anything but totally within his rights as a person.

Scooping the dog up, Lea smiled as he took a moment to appreciate why he was so aggravated at Isa. It was a mundane problem, getting a puppy dropped onto his face while he was trying to sleep. There was no real danger involved, no hurtful things had been done or said. Well, not really hurtful, he suspected the puppy foot going right onto his eye while Balsam had tried to flee might have given him somewhat of a black eye. It was a refreshing hurt, though. Simple, stupid.

“Hey, buddy, we’re going to go wake Isa up, alright? You ready to be really gross?”

Lea would’ve loved for Balsam to respond with a noise, but watching the dog’s head move around at the words was cute too. Funny how the talkative puppy refused to talk when Lea wanted him to for comedic effect, Isa would poke fun at him for that if he was awake. As he held the dog, about to do something that would probably have Isa kill him at least a little bit, he smiled. It was old love. It was new calm. It was… something to help heal him.

It was a talkative dog in his arms the moment he was done wanting a talkative dog.

Lea laughed and bounced a bit, as if he were holding a fussy baby and not a puppy that was going to be too big to hold in no time. “Alright, alright. Let’s go get him.”

Sneaking quietly into their room, Lea stifled laughter. He was much better at it than Balsam was good at keeping from whining, but since Isa had reformed, he’d been difficult to wake up once he was really out. It was good for Isa, but it was also good for Lea and his antics.

“Alright, Balsam,” Lea whispered as he held the dog out towards the side of Isa’s head. “Get him.”

As if truly understanding the cue, Balsam immediately began to lick at the side of Isa’s head. 

For a moment, Lea thought he’d be disappointed as Isa began to move slightly, grumbling as he seemed to remain mostly asleep, but then Isa’s eyes shot open as dog slobber got into his ear. He sat up and stared right at Lea with an expression that made Lea’s skin crawl. After initial moment of fear due to Isa’s horrifying expression, Lea burst into laughter. He placed the dog down on the bed, watching Balsam happily bounce around now that Isa was awake. 

“He really is your dog, Isa. Look at him, he’s so excited you’re finally joining us in the land of the living.”

“You won’t be here for long,” Isa grumbled, expression wearing off as he picked up a pillow and tossed it at Lea’s face. 

Lea, of course, caught the pillow and kept laughing. He sat down on the bed next to Isa and grinned, kissing his best friend. “You dropped Balsam on my face, I’m just getting back at you. Did you give me a black eye with his big, stupid puppy feet?”

Isa sighed and shook his head. “No, of course I didn’t. That couldn’t have hurt that badly, it was just to startle you.”

“Isa, you dropped a husky puppy on my face. A two-month-old husky puppy. He’s way too big to be dropping on your best friend’s face.”

“Hm. No, but maybe he’s too big to drop on my boyfriend’s face. I’ll decide later.” Alone with Lea and a dog really did bring out the dorky side of Isa, proven when he looked at the dog and smiled, immediately falling to his side and scooping the puppy up into his arms. “Good morning, Balsam. Did Lea make you do something gross? Even though you’re a very good puppy. The best baby. You’re only as big as a cat, Lea should be fine.”

“Don’t be rude to me to the dog,” Lea said, looking at Isa with a fond smile on his face. This was good, this was the old love he was so enthralled by.

“I didn’t invite you into this conversation, Lea. Don’t be rude and eavesdrop. This isn’t about you.” 

“It is so,” Lea said with a scoff, adjusting where he was sitting so he could join Isa. Once his side hit the bed, he grinned and scooted closer, pressing their foreheads together, dog squirming between them as the space closed around him. “Tell me to my face what you were saying.”

Isa laughed and rolled his eyes. “You’re bothering Balsam, Lea. Get up.”

“No, that wasn’t it.”

“You’re bothering me, Lea. Disgusting. Get up.”

“Nah, not that either.”

Isa’s laugh rang out loudly and, wow, Lea was in love with the sound.

“I think it was about me somehow. But not being annoying.”

“Oh, now you’re just misremembering,” Isa said with a snort. He leaned over and pressed a kiss to Lea’s lips. “You’re stupid.”

“Not as stupid as the man who loves me.”

“Yeah, whoever loves you is an idiot.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another chapter that isn't incredibly long, but it's sweet. I have another chapter I'm actually currently editing that'll be posted within the next 30 minutes. More Balsam is good for the soul.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one is heavier than the last three, but not as heavy as the first.

It always hit him at the weirdest of times, the pain in his chest that made him realize he had to be on edge to watch for tears the entire rest of the day. He’d feel tears in his eyes for only a moment before they instinctively went away because he wasn’t feeling bad enough to cry. Tears weren’t weakness, but they were dangerous in certain places. While he was no longer in those places and likely never would be again, repressing depression was instinctual.

He excused himself quickly from the conversation he’d been having with neighbors who had recently returned through the efforts of the keyblade wielders. 

Parents had been mentioned and he’d managed to get through that without feeling overwhelmed by the reminder that his parents might never come back, they might just be gone. He’d managed to get through questions about what happened, everyone knew keyblade wielders knew something about it. He’d gotten through everything that had been thrown at him, but somehow, mentioning the way the flowers were starting to show signs of winter made him feel the need to excuse himself and go home.

“Hey, Isa, you home?”

Receiving no answer from anyone, Lea walked to their room. It was oddly quiet, Isa must have taken Balsam out for a walk.

But then he heard a gentle whine from the other room and Lea got worried. His own problems didn’t matter if there was a chance any of his family felt bad, even if that family member was the puppy.

“Balsam? Hey, c’mere, boy.”

The dog didn’t come immediately, Lea couldn’t hear any tiny feet on the floor patting their way over. He was suddenly scared for Isa and every single bad thing got shoved down as he sped his walking up. “Isa? Babe?”

What he walked into didn’t seem that bad, which might be worse. Isa was sitting on the bed with Balsam laying his front paws on his lap, Isa gently stroking his fur. He didn’t respond to Lea when he walked in, though. It was like he was stuck in a loop, stuck in his head somewhere. 

“Isa?” Lea asked, voice gentle as he carefully sat down on the bed. Balsam whined again, looking towards Lea before crawling further onto Isa’s lap. Isa reacted to Balsam’s movement before he looked up at Lea as if he was confused by his best friend’s presence.

“Axel?”

Lea blinked and felt like he’d been slapped in the face. He’d managed to get most people to stop calling him that after years, Isa had slipped right back into calling him Lea when he’d been found. Hearing that name again from Isa hurt so badly, but he quickly shoved it down and leaned over, shaking his head. “No, Isa, no. Lea, remember? We’re back. That’s why you’ve got a dog. The room’s not white. See? Isa, look, the stars you made fun of me for sticking up. They glow, right? That’s not like anything Axel and Saïx had.”

Isa looked up at the ceiling as he was directed to then nodded slowly. “Lea.” 

“Yeah, Lea. And Isa,” Lea continued to speak in a gentle tone, carefully taking Isa’s hand in his. “What happened?”

Fingers curled around Lea’s hand as Isa took a moment to anchor himself again. The faraway look in his eyes seemed to be fading as Lea held his hand.

“I woke up and…” Isa squeezed Lea’s hand, visibly trying to keep himself there. “And I had no idea where I was. Thank you for coming home.”

“Of course. I’m glad I came back early.” Lea placed his free hand over Isa’s and squeezed, carefully moving their hands up to touch the tips of Isa’s ears. “You’re home, Isa. I love you. You’re only you, see? This is you.”

Isa let Lea move his fingers over his ear and nodded. “Yeah. I know.”

They sat there for a minute, silently looking at each other and letting feelings settle wherever they would. Lea’s ended under the surface, Isa’s finally broke free. Tears filled his eyes as he let go of Lea’s hand, holding onto his ear and feeling frantically for his earring. It had been taken out. “Lea, where did my earrings go? I thought I had them in.”

Panic really did manifest weirdly. There was a moment where Lea didn’t know what to do, he wasn’t sure where Isa kept his earrings, he rarely took them out. “Uh, one sec, I’ll find them, okay? Just breathe. Look, Balsam’s here. Healing moon, right? It’ll be okay.”

“Healing moon. Yes.”

“Right, just pet the healing moon. He’s worried about you.”

Isa nodded and began to pet the worried puppy, being very good and very quiet while Isa was… not doing well. Soft puppy fur was good for depression, calming and a good continuation on the grounding Lea was helping with.

While the dog helped worry for Isa, Lea searched the room for the earrings. They were studs. If Isa had taken them out while thinking, there were only a few places he’d put them, but there was also the chance he’d absentmindedly taken them out and placed them somewhere or they fell out. The earrings were old, but good, they wouldn’t have fallen out.

“They’re not on the dresser?”

“Uh, I didn’t see them, might’ve missed something. Don’t worry, they’re somewhere in here.”

Isa still had tears in his eyes and his voice shook slightly as he spoke. “I don’t know when I took them out. I only take them out for the beach.”

“Isa, it’s okay.”

But Isa was shaking.

Lea intensified his search, finding the earrings as soon as he was able to really focus on it. He needed Isa to feel better, needed him to not be shaking while petting a dog. 

“Found them, Isa,” he said, unsure who the constant use of Isa’s name was more for. “I found ‘em.”

Isa, still shaking with tears in his eyes, tried to smile at Lea as he sat back on the bed, only to fall into Lea’s arms, crying. “What if I’m still empty? I’m just humoring what I want. Because I want you, Lea. I want to wake up and not be Saïx… but I felt like him today.”

“You’re not him. You weren’t even him last time you lost your heart, Isa. You’re never going to be him again.” Lea was very carefully holding Isa, making sure to not drop the earrings. Lea was pretty sure they were a gift from someone when they were really young, but he couldn’t remember who it was, he just knew Isa never changed them unless totally necessary.

“You don’t know what I was, Lea.”

“You were possessed and you still managed to help us turn the tide on the bastard doing that. C’mon, I heard you when they got you paralyzed in that fight. You… I heard you call for me. But now I’m here. It’ll be okay. I’m here, I’ve got your earrings, we’re not losing anything ever again. Got it?”

Isa nodded, moving back and wiping at his eyes despite the fact that tears were still falling. He let Lea put his earrings back before speaking again, “You forgot a word, Lea.”

“I don’t forget anymore.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I ended up writing two chapters at once because this one hit me in the midst of writing the other one.


	6. Pullum Odisse Crimen

“Pick up that keyblade and fight me,” Isa stated as he held his claymore behind his back with one hand, large weapon held off the ground as if it was nothing. He didn’t even have to berserk to make it look like the heavy claymore was being lifted with absolutely no effort. 

Lea thought back to when Isa was learning to really wield the weapon and how often he’d need to split that scar open just to use it. Saïx had always been a force to be reckoned with and Axel had never been willing to let himself be left behind, despite Saïx’s racing forward. Looking at Isa and that sword, that sword that wasn’t quite the same as it used to be, made Lea feel a deep sense of dread. 

Sparring should have been a fantastic outlet, it always had been before, but fighting Isa just kept ending with his keyblade launched across the field they had decided to use. Again, he summoned it into his hand, wiping sweat off his face with his free hand. Watching a weapon vanish and reappear into his hand was something of a comfort, a reminder that it was harder to disarm him than simply knocking something away. 

“You gonna go at me for real this time?” The irony of Lea asking Isa to go full out wasn’t lost on Lea, but that didn’t really matter. “You gonna hit me with everything you have?”

Isa relaxed his stance while looking at Lea from across the field. Lea couldn’t see it, but he knew Isa rolled his eyes at him. “Incredibly bold to act like I’m not. What I’m not hitting you with is everything I don’t have. Now fight me for real if you’re going to talk like that. You’ll never get anywhere if you don’t drop that tendency to play defense every fight.”

“Oh? You want me to take the lead, then?”

“Yes, Lea. Yes. This isn’t banter, this is actually what you have a problem with.”

“Alright, I’ll take the lead, then,” Lea said with perhaps too much emphasis on the first half of the word ‘lead’ as he began charging forward, dropping his keyblade and summoning chakrams mid-run. He twirled them in his hands once before throwing the first one, watching with frustration as Isa blocked it easily as he moved back into a fighting stance.

Had he always looked so feral when fighting? Lea didn’t like that the answer was no. There had been a time where he’d struggled to learn an unfamiliar weapon, there had been a time where Isa didn’t sound like he was growling while attacking. At least without berserk, he wasn’t yelling for Lea to get back…

Lea pushed thoughts away as he threw the second chakram at Isa, willing them both to disappear as he took his keyblade with both hands and slammed it down towards Isa, hitting the claymore.

“I said fight me for real, Lea!” Isa’s voice was a growl as he pushed away the keyblade easily. It was as if Lea wasn’t putting any fight into pushing down against the claymore. Isa could easily block any hit with how sturdy Lunatic was and Lea knew that. It seemed to be annoying Isa, Lea could see it in Isa’s face as he stared at his best friend instead of the weapon that had just been knocked from his grip.

“Why are you letting go of your weapon? You’re losing distance and protection, Lea.” It was too obvious that Isa wasn’t trying to fight at his full ability, Lunatic was dropped immediately after the keyblade was dropped. Isa could have easily swung his sword directly at Lea to finish the match. 

Lea’s fingers twitched as he stood in front of Isa. He locked eyes with the other man, summoning his keyblade and holding it up, tilting Isa’s head up with the tip. “Maybe I’d try harder if you did.”

Isa took the threat as if it was nothing, because it was. No real fight would ever allow for an opening like that. He sighed. “I’m fighting you off without trying.”

“So you admit it? You’re going easy on me?”

“Of course I am, I’m not about to throw my sword into a fully formed and living man who isn’t trying to fight back.”

Lea made his keyblade vanish and Isa relaxed, looking at Lea with a tired expression. He almost looked disappointed and that hurt Lea. Having Isa disappointed in him wasn’t something he wanted and it had been his suggestion, sparring to try to feel better. It wasn’t on Isa that Lea regretted that suggestion with every fiber of his being.

“Alright, mind taking a raincheck on this one?”

“Lea, if you’re not comfortable sparring me, you can just tell me.”

“Nah, I’m fine,” he said, jumping back to get back to a starting position. Spinning his keyblade as he summoned it and moved it to rest against his back. He grinned. Anyone else would’ve fallen for his cocky grin, Lea was sure of it, but he could see the concern on Isa’s face, veiled only by slight irritation. “I’m not here to chicken out.”

“Perhaps it’s for the best that we stop this.”

“I told you, Isa, I’m perfectly fine.”

“Alright, if you say so. You wanted me to go all the way, is that right?”

“Yeah! ‘Course I do! Maybe if you actually tried to fight, I’d be able to focus an-”

Lea was interrupted by Isa speaking while he straightened his stance and looked up to the sky with both arms outstretched. “I call on the-”

And, just as Lea had been interrupted, Isa was as well. “Isa, stop it!” Lea dropped his hands to his sides, letting go of his keyblade yet again.

It was obvious Isa hadn’t fully expected Lea to interrupt him and Lea hadn’t expected to react at all. Lea looked down, staring at his hand as he tried desperately to summon his keyblade back into his hand again. His breathing had turned sharp. He looked up from shaking hands and stared right through his best friend. “Isa, stop it…”

Isa dropped his sword, letting the clang of it hitting the ground sound as he rushed to Lea’s side. Lea could barely comprehend what was happening while his heart continued to race, bracing himself for impact when he processed that Isa was running towards him.

“Lea, I stopped. I stopped.” Isa reached out a hand to touch Lea’s shoulder gently, feeling the pain when Lea flinched. “You look like you need your charms again.”

Lea pushed Isa’s hand away as he managed to catch his breath again. “Don’t make fun of me.”

“I’m not. I’m worried,” Isa spoke softly as he reached again for Lea’s shoulder. “You haven’t let me see you hurting since the kitchen, Lea. We need to talk about these things, you can’t just ignore me.”

“This’s a chicken hate crime.” 

Isa blinked and tilted his head. “I’m sorry, what was that?”

“This is a chicken hate crime. You heard me, Isa.”

“Lea, did you hit your head?”

“Nah, but you’ve hurt my heart.”

“I’m sorry?”

“I dunno, I’m just saying stuff now. Don’t need the charms, I’m fine.”

Isa sighed and shook his head, cupping Lea’s face gently, placing his thumb where the upside down tears went. “Talk to me.”

“I thought I could handle it in a sparring condition, alright? It’s nothing really special, I’m just being a chicken.”

“Demyx is a chicken.”

“Yeah, so? There can be two of us.”

“No, you know what a chicken looks like. Running away from problems, fights, everything. You don’t do that.”

“Isa, stop it.”

“Lea, stop telling me to stop.”

“Ah, yeah, right. Uh. I really just don’t want to bother you. You went through so much to help us. You got Even to bring Xion and Roxas back after everything that happened. Hell, you helped train Xion to hold her own even better than before, as if that was necessary. What’ve I done for you? Make you wake up in the middle of the night to find me contemplating… tearing out the heart you fought so hard to get back for me? Really cool of me.”

Isa ran his thumb over Lea’s cheekbone and sighed. “Don’t apologize for being hurt, Lea.”

“I’ll apologize for whatever I damn well please.”

“You don’t need to. What’d I tell you when I found you in the kitchen?”

“Uh. That I’m an idiot and needed to stop crying?”

“Lea.” 

“I don’t remember. What was it?”

“You wouldn’t expect that from me, would you? If I hadn’t gone and done something that big to help, you’d still want me home? Would you tell me to leave you alone if all you had was my asking for forgiveness?” Isa began to move his hand from Lea’s face, but noted the movement of Lea’s head towards the moving hand and decided to leave it there. “Stop expecting more from yourself than you do from others. I can handle you not wanting to fight me. I’m sure seeing Lunatic is bad enough without me calling for help from the moon. I wasn’t thinking.”

“Isa, stop with the apologizing. Thought I wasn’t going to get anything outta you after you got back.”

“I never said I wouldn’t apologize, just that you’d never hear me admit to something so ridiculous ever again. I’m proud, but I want you to…” Isa stopped mid-sentence, trailing off and looking past Lea. “I could explain how it works, would that help?”

“Berserking? I dunno, I’m pretty sure that’d make it worse. It’s terrifying, I know you think it is too.”

“It can be, yes.”

“Then I don’t want to hear it. I just don’t really want to see you do it for now, that’s it.”

“I can do that for you.”

“Thanks.”

Lea raised his hand to rest it over Isa’s, taking in a deep breath. It was easier to calm down than it normally was, gentle touches from Isa helping an immeasurable amount. Standing in the middle of a field and fighting back tears wasn’t exactly the kind of fighting that had been planned for that day.

“If you’re done with this,” Isa said, moving his hand back down to his side. “We should head home.”

“Huh? Yeah, alright. Sounds good.”

Isa reached out a hand towards Lea and Lea, with some hesitation, grabbed the hand and held it tight.

Ienzo had no explanation as to how Lea and Isa could still traverse worlds through use of the corridors, they’d asked and he’d tried to figure it out. There were theories about what had happened, but that’s all they were and it didn’t really matter. Lea raised his hand and summoned a dark portal, but Isa took to leading them both through the deep purple. They walked along swirling ground carefully, continuously moving forward to avoid getting overrun by the darkness. 

With Isa leading the way, he found their exit easily, new portal forming to let them leave the dark world. Their exit wasn’t the home Lea had expected, lights from street lamps filled his vision.

“Twilight Town?”

“Don’t you want to see your family? Remember we’re all safe? There’s nothing to be afraid of?”

Lea couldn’t help the smile that seemed to return to his face. “Yeah, good idea.”

“You go invite them to the clocktower, I’ll be back with ice cream. Like we did a few months ago? But without the other kids preferably, no offense to them.”

Lea squeezed Isa’s hand before letting go with a nod. “Yeah, just the family. I think Naminé’s been hanging around in Twilight Town too, so grab an ice cream for her? Just in case.”

“You have a phone, I could just wait.”

“No, I think you should grab her one and just risk the extra.”

“You can just tell me you want an extra Isa cream for yourself.”

“Huh? What’d you say?”

“Another ice cream? Lea, go get the kids. Go.”

“Okay! Get an ice cream for Naminé!”

“Of course. It’ll take you a longer time to get them.”

Lea blinked and looked to the side quickly, thinking. “Ah, you’re right.” Lea grabbed Isa’s hand to tug him close, kissing his cheek before jogging off backwards, waving and watching Isa roll his eyes then laugh. Lea turned around with a warm feeling in his chest. He had a family again, even if it was missing some things. 

He pulled out his phone to call Roxas.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry about the chapter title. And taking so long to get this out when the other chapters were all relatively close together.


	7. Chapter 7

Naminé joined Lea first, happy to be invited to the clock tower. She knew all about how important it was so she dropped what she’d been doing the moment she had an invitation extended to her. The bright smile on her face warmed Lea’s heart, glad to see someone who had been hurt so badly smile so clearly.

“Hi, Lea! Is nobody else here yet?” Her hands moved in front of her as she carefully closed herself off, looking to the edge of the clock tower with uncertainty on her face.

“Nah, but you can sit wherever you want. If anyone’s mad about losing their seat, they shoulda gotten here faster. Isa’s the only on with permission to be late because he’s getting the ice cream for everyone.”

Naminé laughed and nodded, very carefully sitting on the edge of the clock tower. Her small hand grabbed onto Lea’s arm as she sat, a little shaky and still unsure. “I understand. I’ll move if anyone wants to sit next to you instead?”

“Does anyone ever invite you up here?” Lea’s voice was gentle as he made sure the girl was comfortable with how situated she was on the clock tower.

“No, not really. It’s okay, though! I’ve been painting a lot, so I’m busy.” 

“Oh, that explains what happened to your dress. I thought it was just a fashion statement.”

“It is!” Naminé’s voice seemed to shake with excitement. “I like my white dresses, like I like myself now, but… I wanted more color. So I’m getting them messy on purpose.”

Lea grinned at that explanation. “You know, we can just get you fabric paint and you can go to town on something on purpose? Instead of just whatever you drip on you while being messy about your art.”

“Fabric paint?”

“Yeah, it’s paint that sticks around even after you wash your clothes off.”

“I only have a couple outfits, though.”

“We really need to get you living with some adults.”

“I’m fine! I like living by myself, Lea.”

Before Lea could respond, footsteps attracted the attention of both seated people. 

“Hey, Lea. Naminé! We keep trying to get you to hang out, where have you been?” Roxas sat down next to her, Xion quietly following behind to sit down next to Roxas.

Lea laughed. “Hey, I thought you said nobody was inviting you places, Naminé? You getting into the habit of lying to me?”

“Oh, no? You asked if I was being invited up here, I’ve been invited other places. Sometimes I go spend time with Kairi, since she’s…” 

Lea took in a breath and nodded. “Alone, yeah.”

There was a quiet that spread immediately through the four of them. Xion opted to stare at her hands, Roxas looked up, Naminé looked to Lea, who was in turn staring straight out at the sunset. 

Xion was the one to break the silence as she looked up. “We should invite her here. It’d be nice, she’s our family too.”

Lea blinked, the sun leaving spots in his eyes as he readjusted to where they were. It wasn’t the idea that had him reeling, it was Xion saying they were a family. Out loud. He’d thought it plenty of times, but saying it to any of the people he loved wasn’t something he’d planned on doing. “Hey, yeah, guess we are.”

Xion leaned forward to look past Roxas and Naminé. “Guess we are?”

“Oh, a family,” Lea said, rubbing at the back of his head with a short laugh. “That’s a good idea, inviting Kairi up here.”

Roxas joined Xion in leaning forward to look at Lea only to laugh at him. “Are you embarrassed over being a family? That’s so dorky?”

As if summoned by making fun of Lea, Isa turned the corner to the clock tower’s face. 

“Have I missed something exceptionally dorky or is he just being himself?” Isa asked, handing out the ice creams and receiving thank-yous from each teen.

“Lea’s just being sweet,” Xion said with a smile, taking a bite of her ice cream. “He got embarrassed over me saying we’re family.”

Isa looked at Lea, sharing in his embarrassment for a moment he thought only Lea would be able to read. He was wrong.

Xion smiled over at Isa. “You’re obviously family too, don’t be embarrassed.”

Isa blinked, something about her looking at him and calling him out like that felt familiar. She’d gone from a faceless doll to this child, capable of reading him so well. “I… had expected you to look like Sora if anything.”

Not one person on the clock tower has expected Isa to say something about how Xion looked. Despite forgiveness that had been earned, they hadn’t discussed her appearance, none of them had. Two of them being grossly unobservant and perhaps even worried about saying something wrong, the other three simply opting to stay away from the topic.

Xion raised her hand to her face. “I think I look like Kairi,” she said. “I took Sora’s memories from Roxas somehow and it gave me Kairi’s face until the end… but I’m back and have her face again.”

Isa shook his head. “We both know I’m referring to your eyes right now. And your face isn’t as round as Kairi’s. Perhaps it used to be, I never saw you. I couldn’t see anything.”

Xion shrugged. “I learned things from you.”

Roxas looked at Xion. “Oh, okay. I was right!”

Xion laughed at Roxas’s attempt to look at her closely. “You don’t need to be that close to notice, Roxas. It’s not that important, really.”

“No! You look kinda like Axel now! Oh, sorry, Lea.” 

Lea just waved it off before leaning over to look at Xion. “I don’t see it, but I knew you looked different. Figured it had something to do with you coming back as your own person right off the bat, though.”

Naminé laughed, content to just sit between the other four and watch them interact. Having friends was new, even if she’d been taken care of by Lea when he was Axel for a few weeks. Days? She wasn’t sure, passage of time had been weird because most of what they’d done was run around the dark corridors while Axel looked for Kairi.

Lea reached up and put his hand on Naminé’s head, ruffling her hair with a grin. “Now, what’re you laughing at?”

“Oh, sorry. You’re all funny.”

“There’s no reason to apologize, Naminé.” Isa had gone back to looking out at the sunset, smiling. “We’re all happy to have you laugh. Lea had told me it was just the family.”

“Isa!” Lea huffed as the kids laughed. “Don’t tell them I said that.”

“What? I think it’s important for them to know you’ve been thinking of them as your kids for a while now.”

“Are you our dad now, Lea?” Roxas asked, purposefully putting on a soft and sweet look, looking up through blinking eyelashes.

“My friends are awful. I’m disowning you all. Except Naminé. And Xion.”

“You can’t disown Roxas and not me,” Xion said, giggling. “Isa gave us both to you! So you have to keep both of us or neither of us.”

Lea groaned. “Alright, fine, I love all of you. If you gotta pull it out of me.”

As everyone laughed at Lea, Lea leaned backwards, throwing his hands up into the air to keep them from going behind his head and ruining his hair with ice cream. It was a dramatic motion that was only to be expected from Lea, but, still, it made the three teens laugh harder.

Isa reached out to touch Lea’s forehead with the back of his hand. “Ah, the dramatics aren’t because you’ve suddenly fallen ill. Get up and face your children.”

“You two are basically married, we’re your kids too, Isa,” Roxas said as he collected himself. “If we’ve gotta be Lea’s kids, you’re our dad too.”

Isa blinked then laughed, shock only taking a moment to shake off. “Amazing. I have children.”

Lea looked up at Isa. “You are the one who apparently made Xion look different. I don’t see where she looks like me, but whatever.”

“People can’t often see themselves in others as far as looking at their face goes. Perhaps a picture of the two or you side-by-side would help.” Isa took out his phone and lined everyone up carefully, forcing Lea to sit up. “Say cheese.”

A chorus followed Isa’s request and even Isa had to smile for the picture.


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sparring take two?

“Are you ready this time, Lea?”

“Of course I am. I told you, I just wanted a raincheck on this.”

“And you’re okay with me not fighting with Lunatic?”

“No, I still think that’s stupid as hell, but if you really think you can put up a good fight without your sword, that’s on you, I guess.”

“It’s good practice for both of us.”

“It really just feels like you’re underestimating me and babying me because of last time.”

Isa sighed and summoned his sword, holding it in front of him and locking eyes with Lea. “I throw this at you, what do you do?”

Lea hesitated a moment, unable to answer the sudden question with Isa presenting the sword in that way. He’d only ever seen Lunatic slammed into the ground in front of Isa once and it was not a pleasant memory. Sure, it had become one that was full of love, but the terror that had filled Lea when Isa had slammed his sword to the ground before him still stung.

Even with him standing proud, Lea could feel the pain from before, both Isa’s and his own.

“You’re right, alright? But fighting you with no weapon’s not a sparring match.”

“You could just do something else, Lea. There’s no reason to continue trying to practice against me. We could just as easily go find something to fight together.”

“No.”

“No?”

Lea rubbed at the back of his head, sighing. He leaned back on his heels and looked up at the sky for a few moments before looking back at Isa, thoughts collected and ideas backed. “No, I don’t want to do that until I know I can be around you fighting. This is the only way to get past that.”

“Purposefully exposing yourself to something you know you aren’t comfortable with? I don’t think this is quite what therapy through exposure is, Lea.” Isa rolled his eyes, glad they got past one-word answers, but still just as frustrated with Lea’s idiotic reasoning. The small expression change between his resting face and his annoyed one did not go unnoticed by Lea.

“I know, Isa! I know. I’d just like to be able to go to other worlds with you and fight by your side again without feeling impending doom every step you take.”

“I know that.”

“And this is the best way to convince myself you’re safe.”

“Torturing yourself?”

“No! Fuck, why are you not understanding?”

“Because you’re being insane, Lea!”

Isa snapping at him made Lea recoil into himself. Maybe he was being rash and stupid, he was forcing Isa to the end of his very long, very patient rope. Dropping Lunatic, Isa walked up to Lea and placed his hands on either side of Lea’s face. 

“Lea, I need you to listen to me. I can’t keep scaring you, you can’t keep making me scare you. It’s hurting both of us and I know you know that. You’re being selfish.”

“I’m… I’m being selfish.” The words he repeated rang inside his skull, the truth behind them slicing deep. He was hurting Isa so badly that Isa was telling him? When he should have noticed that he was hurting him? “I’m sorry, you’re right.”

“It’s fine. You just need to know. I know you want to fight with me, but I fight with Lunatic. I’m not going to just hold my hand out and grab something new out of the air,” Isa held his hand out as he spoke, closing his hand into a fist to summon his weapon to prove a point.

A point that was instantly dashed as the weapon materialized in Isa’s hand. Isa remained facing forward blankly as Lea stared at the weapon with wide eyes, previous conversation all but forgotten.

“It’s lighter.”

“Isa, you’re not gonna believe what you just grabbed if you’re still believing that shit you just told me.”

“I’m not holding Lunatic, am I? This isn’t my sword.”

“I dunno, I think it looks like it’s yours. It came when you called.”

Isa looked at what he held in his hand after a few more moments then, with a startled look on his face, dropped the keyblade onto the ground. The familiar noise of a keyblade being dropped before vanishing rang dull in both men’s ears.

“What’re you doing? You just summoned a keyblade without even trying and you’re just gonna drop it?”

“I don’t want one.”

“What?”

“Lea, I don’t want one. They’re dangerous.”

“What, you gonna go around stabbing people through the heart? C’mon, Isa, it’s fine.” Lea walked over and behind Isa, raising his hand out for him. “Summon it again. Just to see it? I tried for ages to summon mine and you just do it by accident. You’re better than me at this already. Pull it out.”

“Choose your words better, Lea.”

“Oh, shut up and do it. We’re past joking, I’m excited for you.”

“Lea, I’m not going to. I don’t want one and I will not summon it back on purpose.”

Lea moved away so he could look Isa in the eyes, or try to as Isa was refusing to meet his gaze. “Isa, are you afraid of them?”

“No, don’t be ridiculous. I’m not afraid of them. They just don’t have anything that makes up for how dangerous they are.”

“You saying Lunatic’s not dangerous? The thing that is so in-tuned with your loss of self for power that it has a completely different form?”

“I’m saying Lunatic’s abilities are not tied to the ability to pull a heart from a person’s body, living or dead. A keyblade is a dangerous thing and I have no plans to use one.”

Lea looked down at his hand, wondering for the first time if sparring had been affecting Isa as negatively as it had been affecting him. He had never really considered himself a selfish person, he’d considered Axel to be one, but he liked the certain degree of separation that came with apologizing and trying to save the world. Despite the desire to heal and Lea’s constant apologizing to everyone, he didn’t really… think about what Isa needed.

“Can you summon it… just one more time?” 

Isa sighed and held his hand out, not having time to grab any blade out of the air before Lea grabbed the hand. Shaking his head, Lea rubbed his thumbs over Isa’s hand. 

“What do you want? Can you make up your mind, Lea?”

“Yeah, I can. I want you to tell me no. I don’t know when I’m being selfish, apparently. I wanna fix that, but you gotta help me.”

“Sounds selfish.”

“Ugh, Isa, I want to try to be better for you. Stop the joking.”

Isa curled his fingers around Lea’s hand, eyebrows furrowed together as he looked down. “I’m fine, we can look at it together. Then I will never use it again and you won’t have to worry about being selfish.”

“Isa, hey.”

“What do you want me to say, Lea? I’m not going to say you’re selfish when I have so much I need to atone for still. You should get what you want. You made friends like the good person you are and I spent so long…” 

“Hey. I only started hanging out with them because they made me feel like I used to feel with you. Which I’m realizing now is still on me. You’ve got all that Saïx-guilt and I only have… some of my Axel-guilt.” Lea brought Isa’s hand to his lips and sighed against it. “I wasn’t a great person as Axel. I tried to be occasionally, but out of my own guilt. Never had the desire to be an asshole, doesn’t stop it from happening. My personality’s still pretty… selfish.”

“Lea, there is a difference between being selfish and unthinking. You realize you asked for too much and you apologize immediately.”

“Isa, just do me a favor and tell me when I don’t notice, then.”

Sighing, Isa nodded. “I will try to… communicate my feelings to you.”

“Oh, that’s not what I asked for, but that’s even better. Communication?”

“Lea, let go of my hand and shut up or I’m going to kick your ass.”

Lea laughed, dropping Isa’s hand and backing up, palms out in a show of retreat. The rest of this conversation would have to happen later, after having months of dancing around the topic of them, they only really liked to have small bursts of real discussion. Problem though that may be, they just wanted to be happy. Both of them.

With Lea backed away, Isa reached out his hand. “Now, I still don’t like these, but,” his sentence ended as he closed his hand around the handle of the keyblade he’d summoned. “I don’t want to seem like I’m afraid of the things, I just don’t care for them. Now, did you want to spar or not?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay so I'm debating on having an update every Saturday or so starting either this Saturday or the coming one, but this is a little late and the next chapter I'm trying to get done today for the TDOV!
> 
> Honestly, if having a weekly update sounds good, please let me know?


	9. Chapter 9

The sparring hadn’t helped Lea let out any steam, but seeing Isa wield a keyblade got him thinking about weapons… Weapons and their active connection to a person. That train of thought pushed him into thinking about the lesser nobodies, wondering if they were still around and if the poor berserkers were still being pulled around by their hammers. Isa was mostly free of his cursed weapon, dragging him around the room in a rage, but Lea doubted those strong-willed creatures with such a small amount of identity were free. The only real way to free them was to kill them after all.

Then he’d started to think about his own nobodies, the assassins. It had taken him such a long time to get used to being assigned that role, but the creatures that were attached to him quickly formed their identities around fast attacks and hidden movements once he realized his place.

Refusing to tell Isa where he was going after they both sat down together, catching their breath and not allowing themselves to touch each other at all, Lea set off through a dark portal to the find out if the World the Never Was still… was.

The buildings were wrong, streets weren’t where he remembered them being, and there was far too many signs of every battle that had ever taken place in the world. It was still crawling with nobodies.

He wondered if there would ever be a shortage again with how many heartless could travel through and infect new worlds. It was a disease caused by both emblem and pureblood heartless, Lea knew all too well the research showed that it wouldn’t be able to be stopped with the numbers they had. Keyblade wielders were necessary and with Sora and Riku missing, Kairi hadn’t been able to join the teams to fight the heartless. Roxas and Xion were adjusting to life with hearts and didn’t have enough time on their hands to waste it with life-threatening adventures. Terra, Ventus, and Aqua were busy trying to set up a real training area in their homeworld. Lea… didn’t have the guts to face even more things head on.

Or at least, that’s what he had thought about himself for months.

“Hey, Lea!” A voice rang out of the deafening silence, causing Lea to instinctively draw his keyblade and level himself out, ready to fight.

But then he saw who was calling for him and relaxed his stance. It was just Roxas, he was still safe to gaze off into the distance without getting hurt. “Oh, hey, Roxas. Visiting the same world as me. Accident or did you track me down?”

“Uh. I kinda tracked you down? Isa said you’d be visiting here.”

“Oh yeah? What d’you need?” Lea swung his keyblade around, resting it on his shoulder as he waited for a reason for being tracked down. It was odd, he had made it a point to not tell Isa. Maybe Isa really did know him too well. Well, that was the problem with having a best friend from childhood, he supposed. Isa would always just… know things, or he’d at least have guesses. He looked down at the teenager who had gone through multiple words to find him, there had to be a good reason for that.

“I just wanted to hang out alone? You’re always spending your free time with, uh… everybody. It never gives me a chance to ask you questions I want to just ask you!”

“You could just say so instead of tracking me down! I’ve got a phone and you do too, don’t you?”

“Oh, yeah, I do.”

“So, what’re the questions?”

“Questions?”

“The ones you wanted to ask me, Roxas. The questions you don’t want to ask around other people?”

“Oh, right. So, everyone else got rid of the Xs in their names, but I can’t do that. What should I do?”

Lea hadn’t expected questions like that. He moved his hands to his hips, letting his keyblade disappear halfway through the motion. Shifting his stance to put more weight on one foot, he realized this was a question he’d have to think about. “Well, names are pretty important. You feel like you’re Roxas, right?”

“Well, yeah, but th-”

“Are you worried enough that you want to change your identity? You identify with Roxas, right? Letters, pronunciation, everything?”

“Yeah.”

“So stay Roxas. Names are important to people, that’s why I want everyone to call me Lea.”

Roxas took in what was said with a pensive face, one Lea knew very well. If there was one thing that really made Lea proud of the kid, it was his ability to try.

“So, you’re saying that no matter what I do, it should just be what I associate with the most? It doesn’t matter if my name’s just Sora’s taken and reshuffled with an X thrown in there for control?” 

“Do you really mean ‘just Sora’s name’ or are you just thinking aloud?”

“I’m just thinking aloud. It’s my name and I want to stay Roxas.” The teen paused to look around at the surrounding area. It was incredibly apparent on his face that Roxas was confused by where they were. That conversation was going to come later, Lea could feel it, but he was glad the focus reverted to questions he could answer. “How does someone even come up with a new name for themself that isn’t just stealing someone else’s?”

“Well, I might not be the best person to ask that since I just went ahead and changed some pronunciation.”

“What? Are you still spelling Lea like ‘Axel’? That doesn’t make sense?”

Laughing at Roxas’s earnest question was probably rude, but he couldn’t help it. “No, no. L-E-A’s supposed to be pronounced LEH-a, grabbed the pronunciation of Lee instead, just didn’t change the spelling. I like L-e-a, felt right and felt like me, but LEH-a never did.”

“Oh, so you already had to make people change what they called you?”

“Yeah. Getting told I was suddenly named Axel kinda pissed me off. Then I come back and everyone’s still calling me Axel! I told Kairi to when I was trying to remember Xion, but it’s still frustrating that people still refuse to even try.”

“Sorry that I mess it up sometimes.”

“Nah, Roxas, I get it. The important thing is correct, then move on. It hurts some people more than others, though, so still be careful. I’m not the only one who’s dealing with multiple names right now.”

“Well, thanks for understanding.”

“Of course I do. It’s important to have stuff explained to you. Like the reason I don’t mind getting my name messed up occasionally versus Isa really minding being called ‘Saïx’. Can’t get stuff memorized if we never tell you.”

“I guess that’s true.”

“Of course it is. You might not be constantly in need of babysitting anymore, but you’re still learning. We’re all still learning. That’s what living is.”

“Wow, Lea, pretentious.”

Lea rubbed at the back of his head and laughed. He couldn’t deny that he was sound a bit like some kind of know-it-all. “Maybe that’s just what you get for calling me your dad for some reason.”

“I mean, you took care of me when I was totally brainless and new. You kinda are. And Isa’s the dad who was kinda a huge dick to start with, but is trying his best to make up for it.” Roxas smiled up at Lea. The kid really was just that full of love and forgiveness and… everything good, even through things that made him grow bitter.

“Yeah? So you’re sticking to that?”

“Well, sometimes people ask me where my parents are, so I tell them they’re hanging out in a garden. So you’re at least my excuse parents.” 

“That I can live with. Always happy to be a way to get out of trouble.”

“Uh, speaking of trouble, I think you’re maybe in some? Isa didn’t seem too happy when he said where he thought you were… And I don’t think I blame him! Why are you out here?”

Lea laughed and ruffled Roxas’s hair, much to the teenager’s chagrin. “Hey, don’t worry about it. I’m the impromptu dad, you’re the kid. I’m not doing anything stupid. I just came out here to see what became of the place with the Organization completely gone. The lesser nobodies are still people, y’know? We should be helping them out somehow.”

“You came out here to kill a bunch of them.”

“Nah, not by myself, I’m not stupid. Something just happened that made me realize that with some good recon and enough of a group, we could recomplete a lot more people. Free them of this… curse they’ve got.” Lea sighed. “I also wanted to know if I could still do something, but away from everyone.”

“What?”

“Well, y’know how I can still make the dark corridors appear for some reason?”

“Yeah, ‘cause you’re seriously depressed like… all the time?”

“Sure. Whatever.” Lea rolled his eyes at that then brought his fingers together to snap, causing two assassin nobodies to appear before him, swaying back and forth, awaiting an order. “Wanted to know if I could do that.”

Roxas looked at the two nobodies and frowned. “I mean, sometimes dusks show up and still call me weird names? That’s nothing to worry about, right?”

“I just don’t like it. Something about nobodies staying loyal to me seems… bad. I don’t like what it implies, that’s all. And I can’t bring myself to kill the ones I summon either, so I need to come back with friends.” Lea rubbed at the back of his neck and sighed, looking up at the empty sky. “It’s pretty here. Never thought about it, but it’d be a city I’d want to go to if it wasn’t for the dead.”

Roxas continued to just stare at the nobodies that were swaying in front of them. It made more sense why Lea was being so lax about the name change despite it obviously mattering very suddenly. It wasn’t often Roxas knew for sure he was right about something, but the look in his eyes when he looked directly at Lea screamed that he refused to change his mind. “Y’know, you’re not Axel if you don’t wanna be.”

“What?”

“Like I’m Roxas since I want to be Roxas. You’re not Axel. Not even if you can still do some Axel things.”

Lea looked from Roxas to the nobodies then smiled, laughing and calling them off. The assassins vanished into the ground as Lea continued to laugh. “Guess you really do learn fast once you’re told. I knew you used to, but you’ve still got it.” Lea took in a deep breath and shook his head. “Man, I’ve got kids years wiser than me all over the place and I’m still expected to be some kind of adult. This is stupid.”

“But you love us.”

Lea looked down at Roxas and nodded, placing a hand on the teen’s shoulder. He tried his best to look as much like a father as he possibly could as he spoke, “Yeah, but I love you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Since I was so late finishing this (I wanted it done by the TDOV), it's been moved to Saturday. I've been excited to post this and it's technically 30 minutes early for me, but. Still. It's been done for days!  
> I'll be updating as regularly as possible from now on! Every Saturday at some point, no real promises on hours, sorry.
> 
>  
> 
> There's now art of the first chapter!
> 
> https://flurryflame.tumblr.com/post/183957242341/chapter-one-of-dolorem-et-consolationem-commission
> 
> Also, as some of you may know if you follow my twitter or tumblr, I'm going to be working on a Norted Axel AU soon as well. That will likely update every Wednesday as something in the center. I plan on writing a few chapters before anything gets actually posted to make sure I can do it, but the outline's on both my twitter and tumblr and you can ask for it here if you'd like!


	10. Chapter 10

“Remember how to do recon, Roxas?” Lea’s hand rested on Roxas’s shoulder, leaning down slightly to be closer to the teen’s face.

“What kind of question is that?” Roxas rolled his eyes. “You didn’t even teach me how to, it was Even. I’m glad he’s way less creepy now, by the way. One time before you all went to Oblivion, he sat in the Grey Area and just kinda laughed at me? Like he wanted to eat me or something.”

“I mean, obviously something. He’s not that weird, c’mon. Give him a little credit.”

“When he was Vexen? I don’t want to. He said something about dissecting when talking about me? He was fucking weird.”

“Roxas, watch your language.”

“Really? Seriously?”

“Yeah, serious Lea. Now don’t fucking curse.”

Roxas looked up at Lea, expression giving away the fact that he was moments away from kicking the man’s ass for what he just said. “Why wasn’t Isa just glad to have you off his hands when you stopped hanging out with him? You’re the worst.”

Lea rolled his eyes and shrugged. “It’s because I’m delightful and hard to not love. Everyone knows that.”

“Alright, whatever you say. Isn’t talking a stupid thing to do during recon?” 

“You went on recon missions with me, did that ever stop me? Besides, we’re checking out a bunch of nobodies without orders to do anything, this isn’t a real mission. Lesser nobodies don’t seem to mind us being around anyways.”

“They’re really not after hearts, are they?”

“Nah, if they were, they would’ve attacked a bunch of us members. That would’ve been real bad. They’re looking for their own if anything. Nobodies are all real self-serving, but they can be given objectives. If they think something’s gonna further their one life’s purpose, gaining a heart and returning to who they were, they’ll drop almost anything. A heart in someone else isn’t going to give the walking corpse who shouldn’t exist anything.”

“Sounds like you don’t actually know anything about them,” Roxas said as he walked down the neon-lit streets behind Lea.

“What d’you mean by that?” There was a moment where Lea’s face twisted into a grimace and he was glad he and Roxas weren’t standing next to each other. 

“Sounds like projection, honestly. I might be younger than you, but if you want to talk about stuff, can you do it in a straightforward way?”

Lea continued to thank Roxas’s recon training for not having them in a position where his face could be seen. He sighed and collected himself before turning to face Roxas, rubbing behind his head with one hand and openly shrugging with his other. 

“Listen, that’s how I understand it. I’m not projecting, not sure who you learned about that from-”

“Olette’s homework,” Roxas interrupted, seemingly unaware of Lea’s annoyance. If he was aware of Lea’s annoyance with him, he looked like he was refusing to let it bother him. The more Lea thought on it, the more likely the second option seemed. Roxas really did grow into someone completely different than Sora.

“Alright, well, don’t interrupt me, all questions can be answered later if they’re actually questions.” Lea’s mouth tightened into a flat line, trying his best to not sound as aggravated as he was. “Olette’s obviously not teaching you all her homework’s saying, but the dusks do want hearts, they just don’t attack everyone with hearts. They’re not mindless like heartless are. So I made some assumptions about them, sue me. Once we do attack them, they’re not gonna be too happy about that. You know as well as I do that lesser nobodies can suck when they swarm you.”

Roxas waited a moment, not wanting to interrupt again, watching Lea nod his head and gesture to go on. “I just wanted to say, maybe not as well as you do. Didn’t that kill you?”

“You don’t actually have to worry about interrupting me, just not as… in the middle of my sentence.” Lea sighed, relaxing almost as quickly as he’d tensed up in defense of himself. “Let’s not talk about death right now, we’re about to try to get a group together to go around killing things in hopes of their heartlesses meeting the business end of a keyblade too.”

“What happens if we injure the nobody too badly? And what is too badly since we have to kill them? Ienzo said Even took longer reforming for some reason?”

“Yeah, well, keyblade traumas seem to be relatively quick on the recompletion, fire’s a little bit of an issue. Unless you’re doing it to yourself and survive past it. I said no more death talk, Roxas.”

“Oh, did you… to Vexen?”

Lea sighed and rubbed at the back of his head. He guessed there was no way to control the conversation topic with Roxas as curious as he was. Today was gonna be a day full of deep breaths and uncomfortable questions. “Yeah. If you want me to be forward with you, I’ll tell you this one thing and you can decide if you still want me to talk to you about stuff, okay?”

“This is a weird way to do recon, but okay.”

“Listen, I did most of what I needed to know before you got here, you just said you wanted to hang out, okay? I already know what I’ve gotta do. besides, you’re the one asking all these questions.” Lea looked around at the surrounding area, making sure the nobodies who were around were still acting like he expected them to. Once he was sure they were safe, he dropped to the ground in a dramatic motion, pulling out his keyblade just to lay it on his lap and lean his elbows against it. “Alright, Roxas, sit down so I can tell you a bunch of shitty things I did to people who deserved something, but not what I gave them.”

Roxas was more hesitant to join Lea on the ground than he’d been with anything else. Hesitation wasn’t in Roxas’s nature. He got placed on the ground in need of some kind of start-up, but he hadn’t stopped since. Lea’s words and their current location combined in a way Roxas wasn’t sure if he particularly liked. 

But he trusted Lea.

After he was seated, Roxas looked up at Lea, ready to listen and make the call on if he wanted to let Lea talk to him. Of course, no matter what Lea said, Roxas was determined to get comfortable enough with it fast so he could help his friend.

Lea was, however, not planning on actually giving Roxas a choice. It was a formality, he just wanted to see how being open would feel around the kids. There were a lot of them and they were all close. Roxas was the best one to test how much he could tell someone about half his age before he felt like he was creeping too far into an unhealthy place.

“So, you want to know what actually happened in Oblivion?”

“Yeah.”

“Alright, you better like to listen to me talk, because I’m about to get into it.”

Roxas immediately regretted what he had just gotten himself into. Not that he minded listening to Lea talk, if he did, his whole time in the Organization would’ve been an unbearable hell instead of just hell, but… he didn’t like the implication that Lea would be talking more than he usually did.

There were a long few moments where Lea looked towards the castle and wondered if it would continue to look like it did, cast out of the passage of real time, or if it would crumble and fall apart as the people whose memories likely held it together stopped thinking about its halls. Lea lost himself in thought, unable to pull himself back to what he was planning on doing. 

There was suddenly a hand over his that pulled him back into reality. “Hey, Lea, you don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to? We’re kinda sitting on the ground in a city of dusks?”

Lea looked up at Roxas and laughed, rubbing at the back of his head. The laugh felt at home in the city of the dead and lost, as did the two somebodies for just a moment. “Nah, Roxas, I’m fine. Just keep thinking things about being here. The world’s kinda falling apart in some places, did you notice?”

“Yeah, in some places.”

“The lesser nobodies and their shattered memories are holding this place together while we’re not thinking about it. I’m willing to bet on that one.” Lea gestured to one of the dusks meandering nearby as he spoke. Their home wouldn’t vanish completely until they were all defeated.

“You think a lot more about real questions than you act like you do. I thought you just kinda listened to Isa most of the time?”

“You saying you thought I was stupid? After all the stuff I taught you?” Lea’s laugh this time wasn’t nearly as hollow, but his eyes didn’t have the usual glint behind them.

“Ugh, no. Don’t twist my words around like that! I’m just saying… I thought you didn’t think as much as you’re thinking now?”

“That’s because thinking about things is never fun anymore. I’d rather just focus on the here and now. The here and now is the there and then right now, though. So. Here I am, stuck thinking about everything happening around me again.” Lea sighed and tapped his fingers against his keyblade’s fire. “So, you wanted to hear about Oblivion?”

“Yeah, but now that you’re back from zoning out, can we do this somewhere else? Maybe we can RTC and talk where there are some chairs?”

“C’mon, Roxas, I just got comfortable,” Lea said, sitting up straight and cracking his back. He realized when he did that that he didn’t really want to be sitting on the ground either, not in the middle of the World That Never Was. Slouching when he could see assassins and their bowed forms was… uncomfortable now that he was a person again. Though, hearing RTC coming out of Roxas’s mouth wasn’t all too comfortable either. “One last RTC to talk about that time I killed some coworkers. Cathartic or something.”

Roxas just looked at Lea for a moment before getting up. “Have you always been like this?”

“What? Hilarious and amazing? Yeah.” 

Roxas seemed to decide that responding to Lea wasn’t the best choice as he began to walk forward without waiting for the older man to get up. Lea quickly scrambled to get up, long legs almost a hassle to deal with when hurrying. Keyblade vanishing as he let it slip from his grip, Lea held his breath as he watched it return to wherever keyblades stayed when they weren’t being held.

“Hey, Roxas, you ever get told where keyblades go?” Lea looked at his hand while they walked towards the castle, slowly closing his fingers into a fist.

“What? No? I never asked. It’s like all the other weapons you guys used to have, right?”

“I dunno, I guess I just think keyblades are probably a little more special than weapons used by the science cult we were all in.”

“Science cult?”

“I mean, I guess you could call it a lot of various kind of things, but science cult’s what I know about it. You not thinking of it like that’s kinda my fault, isn’t it?”

“I guess! I still don’t know what happened at Oblivion, you haven’t told me yet!”

“Oh, right, well. Isa gave me instructions that came straight from the boss man’s mouth.”

“Xemnas?”

“Sure, we’ll go with that still.”

“Lea, can you ever just summarize something?” Roxas rolled his eyes as they reached the divide that there was between the city and the castle. “Also, how are we getting over there?”

“No, I can’t, and I’d say next question, but you’re bombarding me.” Lea raised a hand to the side and summoned a dark portal. “Small trip, should be easy, even if our clothes weren’t specially made by the fairies.”

“I don’t think you should really be using those as much as you do, Lea, it’s not healthy to be using so much darkness.”

“Eh, it’s fine. It’s been ages and my heart’s still strong as ever.”

“Yeah, but, without a heart?”

“Well, yeah, but there was some time before we lost our hearts…” Lea trailed off, rubbing at the back of his neck. He hadn’t really given much thought to what happened in the short time between becoming apprentices and dying before. It took him a moment to collect himself again enough to realize he was still handing out answers to questions without much thought. “Hey, don’t try to get more information out of me than I wanna give. Just get in the portal so we can cross the death chasm that apparently exists now.”

“Okay, okay, wow. You’re the one who was answering stuff, it’s not my fault,” Roxas said as he entered the portal and rushed across the darkness to the exit. 

The exit brought the two of them into the Grey Area and Lea immediately walked to the window, standing where Saïx always used to and staring out with the same intense longing he’d always seen on his friend’s face. Isa really had always been there, no matter how much they both changed over the years. It hurt Lea to think about it, so mocking was the only answer he could think of to make it hurt less. With no Kingdom Hearts in the sky, it was too close to the early days where everything was new and terror resounded in every echo of his empty chest despite not being able to truly feel it.

Roxas walked over and stood next to Lea. “You okay?”

Lea looked down and laughed. “Yeah, I’m just making fun of what Saïx was like.”

“Oh, can we still say Organization names?”

“Yeah, kinda? I’m talking about the disjointed person that Isa became. Axel sure was something else for a while. Looking back, I think I know exactly when I started to be myself again and it sure wasn’t the whole time. It’s part of what I’m about to talk to you about, so, lucky you.”

“Is it really lucky?”

“Nah, not really.” Lea immediately hopped over the back of a couch and slouched onto it after speaking. “I’ll start the story when you sit down?”

Roxas sat down and looked at Lea expectantly. No words were spoken as the teen waited for Lea to begin the explanation of what happened in Oblivion… until Roxas saw something out of the corner of his eyes. “Wait, sorry, there’s something over there. I’m gonna grab it then you can tell me the story.”

Lea watched Roxas dart over to the corner of the room and snag a piece of paper, folding it up carefully and putting it into a pocket carefully before casually walking back to sit down next to him. Tilting his head and raising an eyebrow, Lea looked at Roxas with as much expectancy as Roxas had just been looking at Lea.

“Oh, uh, it’s nothing? I’ve just been finding someone’s letters all over the place.”

“Alright, well, tell me about that?” Lea was all too happy to change the topic and Roxas could see that in the way he leaned forward and opened his previously closed off way of sitting. “You’ve got the floor if you need help figuring it out.”

“Nah, I think it’s really time for you to tell me what happened when you left. Why’d everyone go? And are you going to keep having me try to guess if you’re talking about Xemnas or Isa?”

“Alright, whatever you say.” Disappointment that Roxas didn’t take the chance to talk about anything else crossed over Lea’s face. “Well, alright… Oblivion. Everyone went for science reasons, research regarding replicas, I think you know that much, but it was also research regarding the castle itself. You’ve seen what it turned into, Xemnas probably wanted that. We weren’t told exactly what to look for, just that it was a chamber of waking or something. 

“There were actually a few people assigned there who were organizing a coup, Marluxia and Larxene, so it was perfect timing to get rid of them for Xemnas… along with some people in the way of Isa’s rise to the top. It was probably too suspicious to get all the people that were in the way, so Isa sent Aeleus and Even and… Ienzo. Which would’ve been fine with me if I hadn’t already been assigned babysitting duty and if Naminé wasn’t… so hard to watch get hurt. And the replica…” Lea trailed off and rubbed at his face, sighing and sitting up so he could lean against his arms. “It’s probably my fault Xion wasn’t treated right, I never reported that replicas could develop personalities of their own.”

“You knew?”

“Yeah. Didn’t want to. I did something horrible with the Riku replica that was being used in the castle.”

“What?”

“I made him murder Zexion for me.”

Roxas and Lea sat in silence for a few very long seconds as they both took in what was said. Roxas, having had no idea what had happened in Oblivion, and Lea, having never said it aloud before. 

Lea looked up at the ceiling and took in a deep breath before continuing, “I made the kid kill the only member of the Organization beyond Isa that I respected at all. Ienzo was a kid when everything happened and a pretty cool one at that. We weren’t friends or anything, but I like to think he didn’t mind me that much. It was easy to understand what I had to do, even if it was told to me in a way that allowed for plausible deniability from Isa if I was stopped, but I didn’t fully want to do it by the end of that trip to the castle. It really felt like a lot changed in me then. Felt like I must’ve been giving up.”

Lea paused to catch his own thoughts before they drifted even further away from the conversation than he could handle. “Stop me anytime you need.”

Roxas was sitting in a stunned silence, staring hard at Lea’s shoulder as the man spoke. It was the kind of thing Lea had initially wanted, but there was nothing fun about talking about things only to be shut down. It was good that Roxas wasn’t about to shut Lea down. “You can keep going, I’m okay.”

Being told to continue hadn’t been expected, but maybe it was good. “I don’t know if I was or not. Maybe I was giving up on Isa’s way. It was getting to be too painful and I didn’t realize it was real pain. I… don’t really want to keep going. I hate the part I’m about to tell you. I think about it constantly.” Lea clenched his hands into fists and breathed in slowly, holding hands to his chest as he curled in on himself. “Killing Vexen was… cathartic. Thinking back on how freeing it was is horrifying, especially because Sora was right there. I shouldn’t have let Sora be right there.”

“Lea?” Suddenly, Lea felt a smaller hand on his. 

Looking up, Lea’s heart broke into a million pieces. Roxas was visibly worried, his eyebrows pulled together and his expression soft. He wasn’t used to being the adult in the situation. He reached up and touched his cheek, feeling the warm, wet tears fall against his fingertips. The crying adult who needed to pull himself together, that was what he was. “Sorry, Roxas. That’s basically it. Marluxia and Larxene were killed fighting Sora, Naminé escaped because I let her as far as I’m aware, Aeleus was killed fighting Riku. Sora’s memories were wiped, Naminé repaired them. Oh, right, Marluxia was having her insert herself into his memories instead of Kairi, that was a whole plot. Didn’t work, but it broke Sora a little bit.”

“Oh, is that all?” Roxas laughed as if nothing was wrong and sat back again. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah, I’m good. Talking stuff out sucks no matter how many times you do it.”

“How many times have you managed?”

“Once? Twice, maybe. Plus this.” He prided himself on a tone he felt seemed casual, even with the tears in his eyes.

“Thanks for telling me what happened.” 

“Yeah, no problem.” Lea paused and stared at his lap. “I’m gonna tell you one more thing before I have to just ask you to not ask me questions for a while, okay?”

“Yeah?”

“I think I figured out why I can still use the dark corridors when nobody else can. Or will, I don’t know, maybe Isa can.” 

Roxas just continued to stay quiet, face still soft with concern despite his entire body leaning forward slightly because he wanted to know. 

“Ienzo couldn’t figure it out because I don’t know how much of the experiments Isa and I were in he remembers. We woke up in the coats, I don’t know how I managed to forget before.” Voice cracked as Lea cried, unable to hold himself together like he’d wanted. “We were apprentices, but if you weren’t family, it didn’t really matter. Sometimes experiments happened on even Xehanort from what I’d heard. We could do it then, we were pushed into darkness then, of course we continue to hold power over the corridors. It’s too bad nothing in them was ever helpful like anyone wanted, they really only worked to move us around.”

“... That sucks, Lea. Do you want to be alone? I can come back later?”

Lea wondered briefly if he was really making it feel obvious that he didn’t want to be having this breakdown around Roxas, but he couldn’t do anything but nod. Roxas immediately got up and stood awkwardly in front of the couch for a moment before wrapping his arms around Lea. It took the man a moment to comprehend what was happening, but when he did, he lifted his hand up and placed it on Roxas’s shoulder blade. “Thanks.”

Roxas backed up and nodded. 

Lea didn’t watch him leave, he didn’t watch much of anything until he felt the couch move beneath him. Even then, he didn’t lift his head, he just watched as familiar fingers intertwined themselves with his.

“Roxas told me you went to the castle. Why are you here?”

Lea just shook his head, suddenly realizing he was sobbing as he did. He wondered how long that had been happening. Was he sobbing the entire time? He touched his cheek and it was warm and wet. Trying to take a breath hurt his chest. 

Despite asking to be alone, he wanted nothing less and allowed himself to collapse on Isa. “I need help.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alright! Saturday post again! Keeping on schedule here!
> 
> I tried to cut this chapter down, but it just kept getting longer. I hope it's enjoyable! 
> 
> Y'all should try to guess what Roxas found though :3c


	11. Chapter 11

The first step had been getting out of the castle.

Confirmation that Isa could still control the portals like Lea could was one of the last things Lea could possibly need, but it was the only way to get home without waiting for one of the kids to show up. 

But they got home safely and that was good.

Isa brought them directly into their room, letting Lea sit down as he calmed Balsam down from the sudden appearance of something new and frightening. 

“He’s getting too big,” Lea mumbled, pulling his boots off and haphazardly tossing them across the room before curling up with everything else still on, no matter how stiff the fabric. “Tell him to stay a puppy.”

Isa sighed and climbed into bed, sitting up straight and gently tugging Lea around until his head was rested against his lap. “Would that make you feel okay enough to tell me what has you so worked up?”

“Yeah.”

“Alright.” Isa looked to Balsam and waited for him to stop barking at the spot the portal had been. Once the dog had a break in his barking and looked up at the men on the bed, Isa spoke, “Balsam, can you stay a puppy forever for Lea? No more growing, this is it?”

A well-timed residual bark sounded back, as if an answer to the question. It was a good thing huskies were talkative dogs, it was easy to make jokes and pretend-conversation. Lea appreciated that, even curled up against Isa and fighting back tears. He’d specifically asked Isa to not draw tears onto his face, letting what came come. Tears being shoved aside was probably not the answer to everything falling out of him at once.

Balsam jumped up onto the bed and layed out with his head resting on Lea’s stomach. It was a gentle motion, as if he’d finally figured out what the taste in the air was with the portal gone and forgotten. If there was one thing Balsam was a genius in, it was reading a room and responding in the exact way that was needed.

Lea reached a hand to pet the top of Balsam’s head, scratching behind the dog’s ears as he breathed slowly. He’d managed to calm down, he didn’t want to cry again, despite not letting Isa draw on his face and help him stop the tears where they were. He wanted help that didn’t tell him no, but provided him reason to not cry.

Something about laying on Isa’s lap and petting a dog made his chest tighten up.

“We’re never gonna be back to the way things were, are we?”

“Before everything? No, probably not.”

“Think we could time travel and tell ourselves to hurry it up and get her out? Or tell our younger selves to just leave Radiant Garden? Grab our families and pay the duck to help us leave?”

“What would it help?”

“Our sense of urgency.”

“Do you remember talking to an older version of yourself?”

“No, but does that mean it can’t happen?”

“Yes, it does. If it never happened, it never will.”

“But, what if it helps split timelines off or something like that? I don’t remember where the science landed on that, is that possible?”

“I’m not sure, Lea. Do you think that, if it were possible, younger you would listen to someone telling you to not try to save someone?”

“No.”

“And do you think younger me would?”

“Yeah.”

Isa’s hand stopped moving suddenly, accidentally tugging Lea’s hair.

“Ow! Isa, what was that for?”

“Ah. Sorry. You think I’d be convinced to stop trying to help her? When you’re the one who gave up?”

“I didn’t give up, Isa. I just… mean that if I told you that it’d get me killed, you wouldn’t let me go.”

“I’d still go.”

“Oh. Then I can’t do that.”

Lea took in a breath and nodded, his hand still resting on the dog’s head. The lack of movement made Balsam wiggle, wanting attention. Taking too long to respond to the dog’s request for more petting resulted in two paws pressing into Lea’s stomach stomach and a dog nose in his face.

Normally, that would have caused Lea to smile and laugh, appreciative of the dog’s affection and presence through his pain, but for some reason it just aggravated him. There has to be too much going on in his head to have anything so close to his face, even if it was Balsam. Space was needed and he began to curl up into himself to try to get more space to himself.

Isa easily recognized the discomfort in Lea’s tensed form and shooed Balsam away.

Shooing Balsam away didn’t work, the dog wanted to be helpful and laid back on Lea’s stomach, looking up at Isa with sad eyes. Sighing, Isa tapped the side of Lea’s head, silently asking him to move himself. Once Lea was laying only on the bed and not on Isa’s lap, Isa scooped the dog up into his arms. It was getting more difficult to do, huskies really did get big too quickly. Isa carried an unhappy dog outside of the room, closing the door entirely on his return.

Lea stared blankly up at the ceiling as he let himself readjust to where he was. “Thanks.”

“Don’t mention it,” Isa said, sliding back onto the bed and letting Lea move himself back. Fingers returned to Lea’s hair, looking down at the man who had tears in his eyes again. “Are you sure you don’t want your charms? They’re not there to stop you from crying, they’re just supposed to help you feel like you don’t need to.”

Lea shrugged and shifted so he was on his side, holding onto Isa’s leg. Isa’s words came as news to him, old and forgotten news, but news all the same. Having them constantly as Axel must have gotten their meaning all twisted up in his mind. “I don’t want ‘em, I just… I just want to talk.”

“Do you?”

“Yeah,” Lea said, voice breaking halfway through the word. Tears quickly returned to his eyes as his chest tightened. “I… think I messed up.”

“Do you want to tell me what you think you messed up?”

To say silence filled the air would be wrong, as Lea’s bottled emotions were overflowing as he clung to Isa’s leg. Heavy breathing filled the air. “Everything? So much. If I just kept trusting you… If we’d moved faster. If we realized Xemnas was lying to us the entire time… If I trusted what I felt to be real. I should’ve known the difference between playing that I had emotions and really having them.”

Isa brushed his fingers through Lea’s hair. “I’m going to ask you again, what would you tell me if I was saying those things?”

“I’d…” Lea hated when he was asked that, he really did. Of course he’d tell Isa it wasn’t his fault, things that happened sucked and Isa had tried for so long. Lies and emotions got too hard to handle and they hadn’t even been aware of the emotions. Question he hated or not, it always worked to bring him back from spiraling, even if just a little bit. “You know what I’d say.”

“Right. I do.”

Lea nodded and squeezed Isa’s leg. Silence really did fill the air finally as Lea’s breathing slowly went back to normal. It was hard, the roller coaster emotions could be when they weren’t always fully present. “I was thinking… There are too many people who aren’t back yet. Do you think they’re gone forever?”

“Is that what you were asking? About life going back to normal? It was people?”

“Kind of, yeah.”

“Then I’m changing my answer. I don’t know. I hope they come back, but there’s not much we can do.”

“You told me Roxas and Xion weren’t coming back when you already had them back.”

“I told you Roxas wasn’t coming back when he wasn’t yet back.” Isa leaned back against the headboard and looked up at the ceiling. The stars glowed slightly and he couldn’t help but smile, even with Lea falling apart. He felt selfish for a moment, happy when Lea wasn’t. “Whatever happens, I’m sure our parents would be proud of you. Yours and mine. Hero of light.”

The tone of Isa’s voice wasn’t one Lea was used to, it had hope despite Isa claiming far less than it gave away. Lea looked up, eyes puffy and red and stinging. 

The hope in Isa’s face and voice lessened the frustration clouding Lea’s mind. Isa really was a master of casual magic.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Kinda short chapter. I got caught up in writing last week's and planning future ones that this week's kinda felt off. Anyways! I hope you enjoy it. ♥


	12. Chapter 12

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey, sorry I'm late this week, a lot was going on, but hopefully this chapter will make up for it. ♥

They both had fallen asleep. Isa fell over to the side sometime during the night, and Lea figured it was when he was already mostly asleep based on the fact that falling hadn’t seemed to wake him up. Lea was glad Isa was so hard to wake up again, it had been concerning when Saïx would wake up at the drop of a dime. 

Lea carefully got up and looked down at Isa, sighing and tapping on his legs gently. Isa let out a small noise, almost a grumble but not nearly awake enough to actually be annoyed. Lea smiled when Isa moved into a far more comfortable position before promptly resuming the light snoring that was proof he was actually still asleep. Careful to stay quiet after poking at Isa, Lea searched for his phone. It had fallen out of his pocket sometime during the night before.

He groaned when he realized Isa had moved to be laying on top of it. He must’ve been really tired if he wasn’t waking up from sleeping on what might as well be a brick. Rubbing at the back of his head, Lea tried to figure out a different option. He really wanted his phone.

Then it started to vibrate and Isa again groaned and rolled over, letting Lea snatch it up and dart out of the room, answering it as soon as he was out of the room, not bothering to look at who it was.

“Are you feeling better, Lea?”

Ah, Xion. Not quite who he was planning to call, but he was overdue to talk to her again anyways. Lea sighed and looked off to the side as he sat down on the couch. “Yeah, I’m all better now. No need to worry about whatever Roxas told you.”

“I don’t believe you, but okay. If you say so.”

“I’m not going to put my emotional issues on people who have their own. I have a plan, it’s okay. I’ve got things to do and work out, but I don’t want to dump it all on you and Roxas, alright?”

“Okay, Lea. If you’re sure. I don’t want you to feel like you’re being forced to talk about anything that you don’t want to.” Xion could be seen on the video, sitting on the floor in the abandoned mansion in Twilight Town. Lea figured she was there either to spend time with Naminé or to explore it even more with one of her other friends.

“Xion, you with anyone else?”

“Nah, everyone else went home. We finally convinced Naminé to join us in normal homes, I think she’s coming with us to your place tonight.” Xion spoke as if she’d requested to come over and got the okay instead of them just inviting themselves over yet again. It was a good thing Lea and Isa fully expected Xion and Roxas to come in unannounced. The girl continued after rubbing at the back of her head, something Lea had never noticed her do before. “She’s been living here by herself too long… Nobody should be by themselves all the time.”

“You two know how lucky you are Isa and I don’t sit on the couch totally naked, right?”

“Why would you do that?” Xion looked horrified for a brief moment. 

Lea just laughed. “We wouldn’t, we know we have kids with keyblades who let themselves in.”

Footsteps accompanied by a talkative dog came from down the hall and caused Lea to look up. Xion’s face lit up on the phone, having heard both noises. “Balsam! Lea, let me talk to Balsam. He’s my puppy.”

Lea raised a hand to wave at a still sleep-driven Isa who seemed to be in a daze. 

“Is that Xion?” Isa asked, all but floating across the floor in what seemed like nothing but pre-programmed motions before sitting down. 

“Yeah, she doesn’t care about either of us anymore,” Lea said, moving the phone so the girl on the other end could talk to the dog. With Lea no longer able to watch Xion, he could only assume she was making stupid faces at Balsam based on the noises coming from the other side. Occasionally, he could see where Sora’s personality was in her, but it was increasingly rare.

“I still have a hard time remembering that’s her voice,” Isa said, blinking sleep out of his eyes. “It’s different from what I used to hear.”

“Oh yeah?” Lea looked at Isa with a raised eyebrow and his head tilted.

“You’re talking about me,” Xion said, slightly louder than necessary. “I want to be involved. Bye, Balsam!”

The dog barked happily before running off to grab a toy, letting Lea turn the phone back around.

“What did you used to hear?” Xion asked, newly green eyes somehow managing to look directly at both men.

“Her,” Isa said, a yawn interrupting anything else he may have had planned.

“Her?” Xion was confused, eyebrows furrowed and head slightly tilted. “Do you mean… the girl you talked about when you died last time…?”

“Yes. I saw no face, only the doll you inhabited, but I heard her voice. I figured Lea had been the same the entire time.” Leaning against Lea so the phone wouldn’t have to be moved to have them both on camera, Isa sighed. He blinked when he looked at the screen, staring right at himself. Despite everything else, Lea and Xion both had to hold back a laugh at Isa’s dumbfounded and exhausted face.

Isa looked up at Lea and rolled his eyes, sitting up straight and looking back towards the camera after he seemed to decide that he’d looked disappointed at Lea for long enough. “As I was saying, Xion was created to reflect and I was unaware of her doing anything else. I figured Lea had been seeing the same reflection as I had been seeing… when he was Axel.”

Lea shifted around and rubbed at the back of his head, unsure of what to say about that while Xion was on the phone. He had excuses lined up, reasons he hadn’t heard the girl’s voice, not even at first, but he didn’t think it was right to say anything with Xion right there.

Xion gently tapped on her phone, bringing attention back to reality. “Hey, guys, if you don’t want to talk about this with me around, I get it… but this… is me. The topic is me. So if you have anything you want to say, it’s okay? I know what I am.”

“Was,” Lea was quick to say, leaning towards the phone as if it would make his point more powerful.

“No, Lea, I’m still a replica. I’m my own person just like I was when I knew you as Axel, but I was a replica then and I still am now. Being what I am doesn’t make me any less me.”

Xion’s words left Lea unable to respond, leaning against Isa as he slowly realized that, despite everything, he still had some issues with fully grasping what it meant to be a replica. He’d figured it out already, back before he’d died the second time. Back before she’d died at all… He’d realized he was wrong in Oblivion, that she was his friend even if she wasn’t a naturally made person, even if neither of them had hearts at the time.

But he was still missing some realizations and Xion wasn’t going to let him continue like that. She was still looking directly at him, even if it didn’t completely look like it with the phone. He knew she was locking her eyes onto him, waiting patiently for his response. Isa had grown past replica problems and his jealousy

“Yeah, you’re right. Sorry.”

“You know that Roxas is a replica now too?”

“Yeah.”

“And Naminé?”

“I know.”

“I’m not the only one who is a replica anymore, but I’m the one people think of still. Am I any different from the others?”

“No, of course not. Especially Roxas.”

“No, Lea, not especially. I’m like all of you. I’m me and everyone’s them. I have a heart and I’m a person. I know you know I’m your friend, but I want to be defined by more than that. I’m not just a replacement for Sora, I’m not just a weird connection to Kairi, I’m not just Roxas’s sequel.”

Lea took in a breath and nodded, sitting up again and making sure the camera was only on him. He didn’t want to see what Isa’s face was doing and he didn’t want Xion to either. He wasn’t sure how much more real conversation he could take in such a short amount of time… He didn’t know when Isa passed him in understanding the kids he’d worked with for so long and befriended first… He really did keep getting left behind when people continued to move forward with things he should’ve been able to keep up with.

“I know, Xion. You’re you. I’m working on forgetting where you came f-”

“Lea. I don’t want you to forget where I came from. I really thought you would understand on some level.”

“I… I do. I promise, I do. I just… I didn’t know everything right away and…”

“I don’t need excuses, I… get it. I just want you to think about it.”

“I’m thinking about a lot, but I’ll put this one first.”

“That’s…” Xion sighed and shook her head. “I’ll see you soon, okay? I’m gonna go catch up with Roxas and Naminé and bring over some snacks. Don’t feel bad about not getting me, just realize you don’t and maybe try to.”

Lea closed his eyes. “Yeah, of course. I’ll get it memorized.”

“Thanks. I love you guys,” Xion said with a smile, exaggerating her movement so it was obvious she wanted Lea to move the phone back to where Isa could see. Lea complied quickly.

Isa had managed to push sleep from his eyes in the moments where he wasn’t being spoken to and nodded to the girl on the phone. “We love you too. Bring some of Naminé’s sketchbooks, I have a present for her.”

“Alright!” Smile widening, Xion hit the screen to end the call.

Lea looked down at his phone, lowering it to rest against his knee. “I thought I was better than this.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again, I'm so sorry about being late! Healing is a bumpy road and involves a lot of acknowledging you need to grow up. I hope this came off like that. 
> 
> I hope everyone is still enjoying this fic, I'm putting my heart into it and I appreciate every hit, comment, and kudos. Thank you all so much.


	13. Chapter 13

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You should keep an eye out today or tomorrow for one more thing I'll be posting separately! It's going to be rated M and it's canon to this fic.
> 
> I have [a fic my best friend is writing as a companion you can choose to either read before this chapter (with Roxas) or after it (with Lea).](https://archiveofourown.org/works/18651961/chapters/44232967) Please read it and leave kudos and comments!

Things had calmed down for Lea. He’d taken a shower, washed his face and dried his hair, then spent about thirty minutes getting his eyeliner right. By the time he came back out, the kids were all there, sitting on the couch. Isa had disappeared, which was odd. Lea draped himself across the back of the couch and ruffled Xion and Roxas’s hair.

“Hey, guys. You know where Isa went?” Lea asked, as he moved back. Xion and Roxas quietly scooted away from each other as Lea’s leg came up over the back of the couch. He slid between the two teens and grinned, looking from one to the other before he remembered Naminé was supposed to be there too. “And did Naminé decide to not come?”

“No, Isa said he had something he wanted to give Naminé, so they disappeared. I think they left the house. She had a couple of her sketchbooks too,” Roxas spoke, fidgeting with something in front of him.

“Alright, well, what d’you have there?” Lea gestured to the small box Roxas was holding, confused by the nerves he’d never seen displayed by the kid.

“Uh. I don’t think I should tell you. It’s for Isa,” Roxas muttered, tapping his fingers on the box. He looked like a puppy who had done something horrible. 

Xion leaned forward to reach across Lea and tap at the box. “They’re the letters he’s been finding. We think they’re Isa’s, they match his handwriting.”

“You have… letters Isa wrote and you’ve just been collecting them?” Lea let his legs both slide down and, as his feet hit the ground, he spoke again, “You better not have found things that are super personal to him, Roxas. If you can’t tell me what you found, I’m gonna be pretty disappointed in you. I know you weren’t exactly raised by anyone, but, c’mon. Would you like to write things and have someone else read ‘em?”

“Are you saying Xemnas didn’t read the diary entries I wrote?”

“Xemnas is the worst example possible, Roxas,” Lea said, rolling his eyes. “Also? I have no idea. Xemnas was hard to really… know what he was doing. Isa and I spent years trying to do only that and… I really have no clue what he did and didn’t do.”

Roxas grumbled something and looked at the carefully folded, old letters. “Well, did Saïx read them? He told me to write the diary, I bet he read what I wrote somehow.”

“Saïx didn’t do that, Roxas,” Lea said, reaching to try to get the letters from Roxas so he could check to see how bad it would be. He didn’t want to upset Isa after the amount of swooping in to save Lea he’d done in the past day. He just wanted Isa to have an okay day now that they were past… whatever Lea had been going through.

But that really wasn’t up to him, he was slowly realizing. Footsteps grew closer and Isa’s voice joined the air, “What didn’t Saïx do?”

Roxas looked up in horror when he realized that Isa was back already. The teen quickly squirmed around to hide the stack of letters he held. “Isa… I had something I wanted to give you,” Roxas said, the guilt that was written across his face would be plain to even the most casual acquaintance to the teenager. 

“What… is it, Roxas?” Isa crossed his arms, concerned by the chain of events he’d walked in on.

Roxas looked around, not ready to risk getting yelled at. He had no idea what responses Isa had to being disappointed and… probably pissed off. “Where’s Naminé?”

“She asked to stay behind for a few minutes, she’ll be right back. Now, what was it you were saying you wanted to give to me?” Isa’s gaze never left Roxas, his patience wearing thin quickly.

Lea, sighing as he watched Roxas again look around the room for a distraction. Luckily, even when he was disappointed, Lea was still willing to help out a friend. “Where did you take her, by the way?”

“Home. My old one. Remember how I’d found some of my old clothes? I wanted her to have something clean, so I gave her my old jacket. She’s looking through some of the papers I had found.”

Roxas took the mention of Naminé looking through old papers to pull the letters out and hold them out to Isa. “I’ve been finding these scattered around the worlds and I think I recognize your handwriting.”

Isa stared at the papers in Roxas’s hands for a moment, processing what was happening slowly. Normally quick to figure out what was going on, Isa seemed to be experiencing some kind of system crash. He snatched the letters away as soon as he fully processed everything. “You read them.”

The tone was not an angry one, but a deeply embarrassed one. Roxas realized Lea was probably right, even if it would’ve meant Isa never got the letters back. Maybe reading things he knew were personal was… rude? Roxas locked eyes with Lea for a moment and Lea’s gaze seemed to read and respond to the teen’s distressed thoughts.

“Sorry, I just… wanted to know what the papers I was finding were. The first one was so short and I didn’t know.” Roxas was genuinely sorry. He felt worse with this reaction than he would’ve if Isa just got mad at him.

“They have his name in it, you could’ve figured it out,” Isa muttered, unfolding the letter on the top of the stack. He took a deep breath and shook his head, trying to not seem like he was as incredibly embarrassed as he was. “His name that writes the same.”

Lea realized as soon as Isa finished speaking what the letters were about. “Isa, are those… about me?”

“They’re more of a diary, but I suppose you could say they’re about you. I wrote the first one because mom told me to.” Isa’s voice got quiet when he mentioned his mother, things too often hurt all at once.

Xion looked embarrassed as well, not wanting to watch when she too had read the letters before she realized what they were. The teens, Naminé included, all knew what Isa now held in his hands were love letters to Lea written over the course of far too many years. 

“I might as well give them to you. I’d planned on it initially, I suppose,” Isa said, embarrassment still obvious. Lea had never seen Isa so flustered, not like this. As Isa stood there, holding the letter like he was afraid it would shatter and looking at it like he was afraid it would begin to speak, he traced the top line of the open letter with his finger. “They’ve always been to you, even if not for you.”

Lea watched the world slow down as he was handed the cause of Isa’s embarrassment. Roxas and the girls had read the letters, he wasn’t sure if he wanted to do the same. He wanted to read them but… Then he saw the first line that was written in crayon. “Isa, are you really okay with me reading… letters you never gave me?”

“Hm. Perhaps after the nosy ones leave. So you don’t embarrass yourself,” Isa said, composing himself as well as he could while he wasn’t looking at the letter.

Xion was immediate in her response, hopping off the couch as soon as she was allowed to. “I’m going to find Balsam! Roxas, come with me.”

Roxas shifted how he was standing and looked at Isa. “Can we wait for Naminé to get back?”

Isa nodded. “Yes, of course. It’s been years, Lea can wait to read the letters for another f-”

Her timing perfect, Naminé opened the front door and walked over to join the rest of the group, holding a few papers in her own hands. She looked from face to face and her eyebrows furrowed together in worry, her shoulders were more tense than they’d ever been based on her mouth disappearing into the old, blue jacket. “Did something happen?”

“It’s just about the letters,” Roxas said, shoving his hands into his pockets and looking off to the side. “Y’know, the ones you told me I shouldn’t have been reading?”

Naminé relaxed again, placing her hand on Isa’s arm, smiling up at him. “I saw some of what one of the letters said, it was very sweet. I think it’d be good to show Lea your heart.”

Isa raised his hand, gently placing it on Naminé’s head with a sigh and a smile. “Yes, you’re right.”

The teenagers quickly left, Naminé took Roxas’s hand and followed behind Xion on the hunt for the husky. 

Once the footsteps faded away into the house and up the stairs, Isa sighed. “If you don’t want to read them, I can take them back and put them where they belong.”

Lea quickly moved the letters away from Isa, reacting faster than he could think. Okay, maybe he did really want to read whatever Isa had written about him when they were younger. “I… want to read the blue crayon part. At least the blue crayon part.”

“Read as many of them as you’d like.” Isa sighed, took a few moments to dwell on the new air, then smiled. “They start around the time you broke your arm because you liked me too much. Think about that.”

“I tripped on my own feet because I ran down the stairs the kids just ran up.” Lea couldn’t help but laugh, free hand going to the back of Isa’s neck to pull him into a kiss. “Are they love letters?”

“They didn't start as purposeful love letters, no.”

“But what did they become?”

“A teenager’s pining for the sun.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And the fic my friend is writing are the letters, as should be obvious now! Please feel free to read them [here](https://archiveofourown.org/works/18651961/chapters/44232967). There are currently two posted, but he'll be continuing for a while if all goes as planned!


	14. Chapter 14

“You know, you proposed to me in these letters at least three separate times,” Lea said, curled up on the couch against Isa. Roxas has found somewhere around twenty letters and had handed all of them over, letting Isa dwell in the embarrassment of them being found at all.

The kids had left them alone for about ten minutes after the letters were first given back, but had bounded down the stairs at top speed - Isa swore Roxas didn’t even bother touching the ground with how fast it happened - and announced they’d be leaving with Balsam. Apparently it was teenager-approved date night and the Twilight Town kids needed to meet ‘Xion’s baby puppy.’

Once the kids left, Lea and Isa sat down and stared at the letters for a while, Lea not sure if Isa really wanted him to read more than one. He did eventually read them all, by the time he was done, he was crying. Shaking Isa off with a smile, he read the letters again. And again. He never wanted to let them go, they were Lea’s new favorite possession.

“You should propose to me outside of the letters,” Lea mused, starting his favorite one over again. “We can be husbands, just like you apparently used to want.”

Isa’s cheeks turned red as he muttered something Lea couldn’t hear and turned to face away from the man leaning against him. Isa was cocky and liked to pretend to be cool and aloof, but that didn’t stop the stupid things Lea said from embarrassing him. 

“What was that? Couldn’t hear you,” Lea said with a laugh, looking up as Isa from where he’d settled his head and grinning. “You did want to be married in these letters? You specifically say marriage at least once. C’mon, don’t be so shy.”

Isa coughed and continued to avoid making eye-contact with Lea. “I said, ‘no chance I’ll be asking you something like that.’ You only made it worse.”

“Aw, guess it’s up to me, then,” Lea said with a laugh, leaning up to kiss Isa’s cheek then settling against his chest again. “I’ll have to get down on one knee and confess how much I love you. Make a big speech and woo you with my love.”

“Wait, no,” Isa looked down at Lea in a moment of horror that confused Lea.

“What’s up?”

“I… want to propose to you.” It was almost hard for Lea to hear, but he was actively trying to listen and Isa didn’t turn away again. “You… deserve romance, despite what little I do for you.”

Lea just smiled and moved to kneel on the couch, cupping Isa’s face in his hand gently to move it so he was looking towards Lea. “Then take your time, I’m not going anywhere. Whatever you do, I’ll say yes. I’m not looking for romance, I’m looking for you.”

“You say, romantically,” Isa said with a small sigh, shaking his head. “I want to wait. There are things I want to do first.”

“Honestly? Me too. Wanna have my mom’s cabbage that you hate again before I get hitched.”

Isa laughed and nodded his head. “Well, just not in our house.”

“We’ve been living in my old house! You can’t tell my mom to not cook in her own house.”

“That was another thing I wanted to do before we do anything about getting married… I wanted to ask the restoration committee if they know of any homes they rebuilt that were previously vacant.” As Isa spoke, Lea relaxed against his chest again. Isa began to play with Lea’s unruly hair, brushing his fingers through it and smiling. “I wanted our own house to live in instead of your parents’ house. As much as I miss them, I’m not going to live with your parents when we get them back.”

“You sound optimistic. It’s a nice look.”

“I thought I might try it, you look so good with it.”

Lea laughed and placed the letters down, gently tucked under his leg so they wouldn’t fall from the couch if either of them moved too much. He turned his head and kissed Isa’s chest. “I love you.”

“I know you do.”

“Not gonna say it back?”

“You have the letters.”

“Alright, fine. You want one of the embarrassing things I did as a kid, then? Is that what it’s gonna take to get you to say things back to me again?” 

“That fully depends on what it is, Lea.”

Lea moved the letters to the coffee table almost instantly, wanting to be able to show Isa what it was that had him so embarrassed as a child. When he got up, there was a hop to his step as he rushed to the stairs like a child, excited to show someone something. Lea looked back to Isa for a moment, just in time to see a look of affection settle on the man’s face, then bounded up the stairs with an excitement he’d only had prior to their deaths.

Lea returned and immediately held a small box out to Isa, grin spread on his face in a way that seemed like it’d be next to impossible to get it off. “I got these for you right before we started looking for the girl. One of them for you, one of them for me. Open it.”

Isa took the box, but hesitated in opening it. He looked up at Lea with a raised eyebrow, not sure why these things would be embarrassing if Lea was so excited. Slowly, he opened the box, a soft, warm smile spreading on his face as he looked at the contents. “Lea, these are beautiful. Did your parents buy them?”

“Nah, I saved up money all year. They were a lot, but… y’know, I thought giving you the sun would be a good way to ask you out if I wasn’t chicken about it. And I’d give you the moon if I was. Chicken.” Lea rubbed at the back of his neck and looked up, laughing. “They were real expensive for a kid, but they’re probably not worth that much now. Anyways. Necklaces. You can have whichever one.”

“You said I’d get the sun?”

“Yeah, ‘cause I wanted to be the sun to your moon. And I wanted you to know you’ve got me.”

Isa picked up the moon necklace and gestured for Lea to come closer. Lea listened, leaning over with a smile, he could see exactly where this was going. Finding himself right, necklace placed around his neck, he laughed.

“And you have me.”

“Aw, you’re being sappy,” Lea said with a laugh, happy to tease Isa for the exact thing he’d been planning on doing.

“You are not allowed to make fun of me for that if you ever want it to happen again,” Isa said with a faux-stern tone and a shake of his head as if he was trying to scold the redhead.

“Alright, alright, I’m sorry.” Lea rolled his eyes and sat back on the couch, laying across Isa’s lap and grinning up at him. “I’ve got you.”

“I’ve got an overgrown child is what I have.”

“You are an overgrown child, Isa,” Lea grumbled, not appreciating the implications that he was childish enough that Isa wasn’t up there with him.

“And I aim to grow out of that, I fail to see you doing the same.”

Lea huffed and reached around on the couch until he found a pillow, immediately throwing it at Isa’s face. Grumpy expression faded from Lea’s face as he laughed, having fun with his best friend again.

“You see? Childish behavior. That’s exactly what I was saying I’m trying to stop,” Isa said while simultaneously shoving Lea off his lap and onto the floor.

“Hey!” Lea sat up with comical speed, bouncing back before he looked up with a glare.

“I never said I was succeeding.” Isa shrugged and smiled, offering Lea a hand. 

Eyeing it suspiciously, Lea slowly took it, not trusting Isa for one second. The mistrust was misplaced as Isa helped Lea back up onto the couch. Lea, however, wasn’t going to let this be done. He straightened his shirt and took in a breath, refusing to look at Isa, staying in this position for a few moments before acting. 

He all but pounced on Isa, shoving him backwards and laying with his full weight on him. IT would’ve been awful for Isa when they were kids, but Lea was still just long and lanky and Isa had muscles now, he was more than able to support Lea’s weight.

“What exactly is your point here?” Isa asked, shaking his head and pretending to be wholly disappointed in his friend.

Lea huffed and sat up, straddling Isa and looking down, trying to figure out how to continue this. He shoved his hand in Isa’s face as he thought, making the normally straight-faced man squirm and try to pull away from Lea’s hand.

Laughing, Lea decided to stop trying to think of new ideas and just lean into what he was doing, muffling Isa’s voice and annoying him by keeping his hand on his face. Isa didn’t care for being touched like that and Lea knew how to stop before it got really bad. 

“Lea, I swear, you’re ridiculous,” Isa said, annoyance clear despite his voice being quiet.

“Oh? Am I?” 

Defeat seemingly accepted, Isa ragdolled on the couch and let Lea have his moment of victory before licking his hand. Lea, paralyzed by confusion, stared at Isa who, despite having his face covered by Lea’s hand, seemed to be gloating. Removing his hand, he glared at the man under him. 

The only way to respond in Lea’s mind was even more childish than any action. He leaned down and pressed his nose against Isa’s, staying still for a few moments before moving to the side quickly and licking up Isa’s entire face.

Isa shoved Lea off the couch again, this time causing Lea to bring his elbow down, through the coffee table. 

“Ow, fuck.”

Isa sat up quickly then slid to the floor next to Lea, worried he’d pushed the game too far with his shove. “Lea, are you okay?”

“Yeah, yeah. I’m fine,” Lea grumbled, sitting up and rolling his shoulder, looking down at their poor coffee table. He gathered the letters and held them tightly in his hands. “Nothing a little cure won’t fix. I, uh… gotta agree with you on the ‘we should grow up’ thing, though. That might… be good for us.”

“Yeah. Start with brushing your teeth, we’ll get to the rest eventually.”

Lea rolled his eyes and gently shoved at Isa’s chest. “Shut up, I brush my teeth.”

“Then why does your breath still stink so bad?”

“It does not.”

“It does. Really, I’d suggest you go brush your teeth now before they fall out.”

“I hate you so much.”

Isa shook his head and leaned over to kiss Lea’s cheek. “I love you too.”


	15. Chapter 15

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey!! I'm really sorry for the radio silence from this fic for the past few weeks, I've been busy and really tired. Hopefully I'll be back on track for Saturday posting again. Thanks for waiting.

“Are you two unhappy holding residence in both the homes you currently have?” A slightly raised voice came from Even. It wasn’t angry, just confused and Even had a tendency to emote in a rather loud fashion.

“It’s not that, we want to leave our childhood homes for other reasons,” Isa said plainly, shaking his head and sighing. “We have plans that would be hurt by not moving out.”

“Are you two planning on searching for people again? Might I suggest asking for assistance and explaining your plans before doing things? Many of us would like to help again.”

“Even, I appreciate the offer, but we would very much like to not chance doing what we are doing without a keyblade being present. We’re unsure of how deaths of nobodies and returns of somebodies would be changed without a keyblade in the area.” Isa sighed and shook his head. “And, as I’m sure you know, this isn’t something we should really be experimenting with.”

Heavy silence came from Even, joining with Lea’s. The problem with earning forgiveness was that a person’s guilt was often stronger than any comfort given. A single string of words could drag past mistakes to light, even if it wasn’t what was what anyone had intended. 

Even and Lea only briefly locked eyes, but the feeling that created was awkward enough that it caused Isa to step between them to direct attention back to the conversation at hand. Things were in the past and Isa had told the both of them time and time again that they nobody was mad at anyone else. Most everyone looked for atonement in some way and those who looked deserved forgiveness.

Lea rubbed at the back of his head and laughed. “So, yeah, we just wanna make sure if our parents end up coming back, we’re not living where they are. Don’t wanna push anyone else outta their homes either, since everyone coming back’s the same age as before.”

“Ah, yes, that has been strange, hasn’t it? The process that caused people to become the lesser nobodies-”

Even was cut off by Lea coughing and leaning back, scratching at the back of his head and waiting for both pairs of eyes to be on him before speaking. “Should we really be calling them that?”

“What?” Even’s expressions were ever-changing, so Lea had always found it funny to mess with him to get new, incredibly funny faces. Sometimes it really felt like maybe there could have been ways for them to have stopped hurtling the world towards the fall and be a weird part of the science family.

Lea almost wanted to have that. It took him a few moments to pull himself back to make fun of the scientist.

“Lesser? Like we were better than them?”

“I can tell you’re feeling better about what transpired between us if you’re making comments about things you don’t care about.” Even frowned, shaking his head at the childish antics.

“Nah, I totally care about this,” Lea said with a smug grin on his face.

“No you don’t,” Isa said, rolling his eyes back at Lea.

Lea shoved at Isa’s shoulder with a laugh. “Wow, thanks, Isa. Not gonna let me have any fun today.”

“We have things to do and leaving a 6 month old husky puppy alone only works for so long.” Isa frowned and shook his head, brushing off his annoyance at being shoved.

“I told you we shoulda brought him along. Ienzo loves him,” Lea insisted.

“Not in the lab he doesn’t,” Even said, eyebrows furrowing.

“Nah, he likes him in the lab, you’re just no fun.” Lea snorted. 

“Have you taken your dog that you don’t even trust at home into the lab?” Even frowned, his entire face twisting up in displeasure.

“It’s not that we don’t trust Balsam, it’s that he gets lonely,” Lea said with a roll of his eyes.

Even rolled his eyes and gestured for the two younger men to follow him. “If you wanted me to hurry, you should have just said so instead of letting us stand around.”

The younger two knew not to bother with any additional arguments against what Even said. Talking while walking had been what they’d wanted the entire time, but asking for a new house had stopped Even in his tracks. Lea bumped his hand against Isa’s as they walked, hoping to have it held, but Isa didn’t respond. 

“While you two are here, there’s been discussion in the castle over how you used to be important assets to our team while we were unaware of your true standings,” Even spoke evenly, not allowing any interruption with his words’ spacing. 

However, he took a breath, leading to Isa interrupting. “We were apprentices, yes, but some of you treated us as experiments ourselves. We died in the coat, you surely remember that.”

“Well, yes! But beyond that. You were very-”

“Useful. Yes. We know.” Isa sighed and shook his head. “We’re all working towards apologies, but that doesn’t mean all has been forgotten. You know that. It’s why you can’t be around Lea for extended periods of time. You’re capable of irrational fear and grudges that have been forgiven.”

“Still, you both have a job here if you ever change your mind. We would all like a second chance at truly working with you, smart as you used to be.”

“Thanks, but I’m busy being a keyblade wielder,” Lea said with a wave of his hand.

“And I will not work here until Ienzo is king. I want someone I trust in control.” Isa spoke firmly, not caring who heard him. Forgiveness was something earned and didn’t have to be verbally asked for, but sometimes the words used to ask caused apologies to be left unaccepted.

“Besides, Isa’s got a keyblade now too, so he doesn’t need the job,” Lea said with a proud grin, watching Isa cringe out of the corner of his eye.

“That holds no bearings on what I can and can’t do. I haven’t summoned it more than twice.”

“From what I’ve been told about keyblades, someone must first bequeath a keyblade to the person who later summons it outside of certain circumstances,” Even began, looking at Isa as if he hadn’t heard the discomfort in the younger man’s voice. It was likely he hadn’t and the curiosity had taken over. “Did someone give you your keyblade in any manner?”

“No.” Isa’s answer was short, not wanting to discuss it further. 

“Don’t think anyone gave me mine, actually,” Lea said, rubbing at the back of his head as he thought about it. “Maybe when Ven kicked my ass with his toy one?”

“I’d like to stop trying to figure this out and continue walking. I want to have a house decided on within the next year.” Isa spoke with an edge, irritates by the continued discussion of a topic he hated.

“Of course. Let us continue,” Even said with a nod, leading the two deeper into the castle so they could search the old census and housing records from before the fall. “Would you two like to stop by the lab? It’s been a while since you’ve come by and I believe Ienzo misses having someone younger around.”

Lea snorted at that. “Last time we were here, I told him to shut it. Which was a little shitty of me after… Well, I’m sure he’s mentioned what happened.”

“No. He has not.” Even raised an eyebrow and Lea had to push through wanting to laugh at the man’s face when talking about serious things.

“Let’s not talk about it right now. Don’t wanna think about that stuff too much. Bet none of us do.”

“Ah, I suppose that… makes sense.” Even’s words had a bite to them, but everyone knew nothing would come of it. The past twelve or so years had been hard to stay good through, grudges weren’t being held except for a very select few. The only people who held grudges against the three who walked the halls of the castle together were themselves.

Lea, again, bumped his hand against Isa’s, this time hooking one of his fingers around Isa’s pinky. Isa looked down at their hands, pulling away slightly before he fully processed what Lea was asking for. It was easy to tell Isa had figured it out because his grip on hand was immediate and strong. Isa was shaken to the core over something and Lea searched his best friend’s face for an answer as to what it was.

It hit him suddenly that they were inside the castle when he started talking about keyblades. “Hey, Even, go on ahead? We’ll catch up. I just realized I had something I wanted to say to Isa and I don’t wanna forget it.”

“Something you can’t get memorized?” Even’s voice was flat again, only his face giving away his emotion. Eyebrow raised with a slight quirk of his mouth, Lea knew a smug look when he saw one.

“Yeah, yeah. Thanks for helping us out with this, no need to make sure I know you’re an asshole.”

Even looked at Lea with a very suddenly exhausted face and shook his head before turning to walk. “I’ll be… how would you say it? Leaving now.”

Lea snorted, immediately distracted from what he’d been planning on doing. Isa squeezed Lea’s hand to bring him back as soon as Even was out of earshot.

“What is it you want to talk about?”

“Well, I said I was gonna make an effort to stop being so selfish. I wanted to make sure I apologized to you right away without having anyone else around.” As Lea spoke, his free hand rubbed at the back of his head. He let out a nervous chuckle. “Don’t wanna let you think I was making you uncomfortable on purpose. I’m just proud of you. I dunno exactly how you got the keyblade-”

“We both know how it happened,” Isa interrupted, staring directly at the floor. “The way I got the thing isn’t even a reason to trust it. We held your keyblade together, remember? The night you were trying to make it all stop again.”

Lea blinked and let go of Isa’s hand, standing still for a moment as he professed the truth in Isa’s words. 

“You’re right, I guess.” He took in a deep breath and wrapped his arms around the other man, fingers brushing through blue hair. He kissed the top of Isa’s head. “Sorry that thing’s got nothing but bad memories right now. I was thinking, maybe you use it while we try to find our parents?”

Isa was still, not returning the hug and barely leaning into it. “I suppose. I’m not very happy about the idea of being the one to bring my parents back, but that’s not fair to you, leaving you with more of the dirty jobs because I continue to put work onto others’ shoulders.”

“Hey. Isa, no. You stop that,” Lea spoke softly. “Wanna head home? I can get the stuff here finished?”

Isa breathed deeply, remaining otherwise silent. After a few long, heavy moments passed, Isa brought his arms up to hug Lea in return. “I’m fine. It’s no trouble. Just give me a moment and I’ll be fine.”

Lea brushed his fingers through Isa’s hair again and nodded, resting his face on the top of Isa’s head. “Love you.”

Time passed as they stood in one of the castle’s halls, but they didn’t pay much attention to that. With no idea how long it had been, they slowly parted and looked down the hall to where Even had gone. They weren’t afraid of the castle, but with how much they’d been thinking about recently, holding each other’s hand seemed like the best idea.

They must have been out of it for a while because they almost immediately saw Even walking back with Ienzo in tow, carrying papers.

“Lea, Isa, it’s very nice to see you both. Even said you were looking for a new place to live?” Ienzo began to walk faster than the other scientist, holding papers out to Isa. “I trust these will be enough information for you. The homes I have pulled have been vacant since long before the fall. They were in disrepair before the fall as well, but in the committee’s rebuilding efforts, they repaired these as well. You may move into whichever you choose, just tell us when you do so we can keep housing records up to date.”

It was good Isa had prepared himself to keep up with whatever scientist they ended up talking to because Lea hadn’t. While Lea processed Ienzo’s words, Isa nodded and smiled.

“Thank you, Ienzo. I hope we didn’t take too long to join you.”

“Oh, no, not at all. With both Even and I looking, it was simple enough to locate the information. It’s all been recently organized and this information is necessary to know on a regular basis.” Ienzo was still smiling. “If you’d like, I can get someone to help show you around the houses and move things with you?”

“I think we can do it on our own, thank you, Ienzo,” Isa said with a nod, looking through the papers.

“If you’re offering to come with us and hang out, though, that’s totally fine.” Deciding to let Isa deal with looking at the papers he’d been handed alone unless a request came for help, Lea grinned at Ienzo. “Bet you’d like to see how much Balsam’s grown since you saw him, what? Last month?”

“I’d like that very much, thank you.” Ienzo looked over at Even, asking for permission that he’d never tried to get before.

Even sighed and shook his head. “You are an adult, Ienzo. Go have fun, you were already taking a small break from your work.”

“Please let Master Ansem know as well?” Ienzo had bright eyes along with the smile on his face, happy to be spending the day with friends. Friends who were more than happy to have him join them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapters One ([Twitter](https://twitter.com/Cherophobe/status/1114265774053634048), [Tumblr](https://sollea.tumblr.com/post/183957285695/flurryflame-chapter-one-of-dolorem-et)), Two ([Twitter](https://twitter.com/naotoosh_art/status/1131745678647025665), [Tumblr](https://sollea.tumblr.com/post/185098104230/flurryflame-xion-and-lea-get-isa-a-puppy-his)), and Seven ([Twitter](https://twitter.com/naotoosh_art/status/1114617118186770433), [Tumblr](https://sollea.tumblr.com/post/184002095740/flurryflame-sea-salt-family-selfie-commission)) all have art now!


	16. Chapter 16

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm super sorry for taking so long with this chapter! I kinda burnt myself out, but I took a vacation and knocked this chapter AND next week's out, so there's something coming next Saturday too for sure. Thank you so much for reading this fic, I appreciate every hit.

They’d gone home to look over things and decide what homes they should actually bother going to check out. Isa sat down almost instantly because didn’t feel like going through papers while standing up. Felt too much like the past for comfort. Standing and going through paperwork was too Saïx for comfort.

“So, are any of those locations places you’d be interested in living? They weren’t ideal home locations when we were younger, but, I assure you, they’re very nice now, even if isolated from most everyone else,” Ienzo hovered over Isa’s shoulder as they looked at the papers. 

Looking up at Ienzo, Isa shrugged. “It’s not as if we’re against walking to get places we want to go. The main world area is small enough that it doesn’t matter much, it’s not as if any of these homes are in the surrounding area that we can’t get to but by boat, right? Unless I’m mistaken? Lea?”

Lea had wandered from the kitchen table to the fridge a few minutes before Ienzo and Isa actually started talking about things, so when he was directly addressed, he blinked. “Yeah, what’s up?”

“Am I making a mistake in assuming we don’t mind the outskirts of town?”

“Nah, I just want a place big enough that people can crash when they visit and Balsam can be happy without breaking things with his giant body,” Lea said as he gestured to the dog sitting directly next to him while the fridge door was open. He’d opened it to get a snack while the other two were talking, bored of talk and papers. Balsam was a magnet to the open fridge, watching for any opening to steal food right out of it. “We have a fridge and some space and we’re all happy.”

“Ah, yes, that does take some of these homes out, I believe. Not all of them have had appliances installed.” Ienzo began to pull some of the papers aside, taking them away from Isa without letting him have any real say in it being taken. Isa sat back and watched as Ienzo decided which houses weren’t worth their time. Suddenly, nobody was able to do any work as a dog bounded over to the people who didn’t just eat food without giving him any.

Balsam shoved his nose against Ienzo’s leg, whining for attention after the heinous crime Lea had just committed. Ienzo looked down at the dog then up at Lea. “Did you not give him anything?”

“He’ll get fat, Ienzo,” Lea said, perched on the kitchen counter with a bowl of leftover curry. “And dogs can’t eat everything I’m eating. It’s got onions and I think garlic?”

“Of course it has garlic. It’s the curry, right? Why would it not have garlic in it, Lea? Would either of us make something without garlic?” Isa reaches down to scratch at Balsam’s head. “No curry for you, no matter how many times you ask.”

Ienzo frowned and looked from dog to Isa. “But if he’s asking for food, doesn’t that mean he’s hungry?”

Immediately after the word “hungry” passed through Ienzo’s lips, Balsam barked and bounced. Isa tapped the table, drawing Balsam’s attention back to him. Paws hit Isa’s legs and legs were turned away from the dog. Ignoring Balsam’s behavior was the only real way to get it to stop. Isa collected the papers that remained on the table and looked at Ienzo. “Well, I think we’ve narrowed it down enough. As soon as Lea puts the curry he didn’t even warm up-”

“It’s fine like this,” Lea interjected, offended by Isa’s pointed attack on his unwillingness to bother warming food up.

“It’s disgusting like that. Warm up your food,” Isa snapped. Breathing slowly, he handed Lea the papers and took the bowl away from him, shoving it straight into the fridge. “We’ll come back and you can eat that after you warm it up. You are not immune to having your food bowl taken away.”

Lea stared at the papers in his hands and sighed, shaking his head in mock-disappointment. “Wow, Isa, just stealing my food. What if I wanted to hang out here for a while?”

“We shouldn’t be keeping Ienzo,” Isa said, rolling his eyes. “Not so you can sit around and not warm up your curry.”

“I’m actually fine here, I’ve been told there’s no rush for me to come back to the lab. Apparently I’ve been overworking myself, but none of the other apprentices have been willing to tell me.” Ienzo shrugged, looking down at the dog who was again at his feet. “I enjoy being around you both, if you don’t mind me being here.”

Lea snorted and hopped off the counter, handing the papers to Ienzo. “Why would we mind? I’d think you’d mind being around us. Me.”

“Lea,” Isa said in a flat voice. The kitchen was not the place for Lea’s existential dread and guilt anymore, it tore Isa’s heart and soul to shreds to think about… things. “Please don’t.”

Lea rubbed at the back of his neck and sighed. “Yeah, okay, well.” He looked to Ienzo. “You wanna show us where those places are?”

“Ah! Yes. Yes, we can go.” Ienzo shuffled the papers around based on how close the homes were then smiled up at the two. “Can we take your dog as well? Maybe he’d like to see your possible new homes?”

“Uh, yeah, sure. Hey, Balsam, wanna go on a w-” Lea was stopped by the dog bolting for the door, bouncing happily by the place they kept his harnesses, the current one and the last one he’d grown out of that they hadn’t thrown away yet. Balsam was happily barking and Lea smiled, amused. There was nothing better to bring a person back to good thoughts than a happy dog. 

Isa walked over and calmly got Balsam into his harness and clipped the leash on. “You’ve alerted the dog, we have to go now or Balsam will rip my arm off.”

“Yeah, yeah, we’re coming.” Lea gestured for Ienzo to come with him as he exited the kitchen, holding up his fingers to count down from three for Isa. Balsam had a tendency to try to bolt out of the house and he was getting too big to do that without preparation. He opened the door with his hand in fist, watching with glee in his eyes as Balsam’s excitement redirected from the doorknob to the outside world.

Isa held tight to the leash despite Balsam’s pulling until the dog circled back. He was still an excitable puppy, so pulling was all too frequent at the start of walks, so they had to find something for him to keep him from dislocating shoulders with the strength he didn’t know he had. It had been a few months since they got him, so he was getting bolder in his attempts to break the rules. It was a good thing Lea and Isa had practice with dogs from their first time as somebodies. 

Ienzo watched silently as Isa got Balsam under control. Lea and Isa watched Ienzo walk up to the dog and begin to pet him, forgetting momentarily that they were doing something that wasn’t just about the dog. Eventually, he looked up at the two taller men and let out a small, “Oh,” before leading the way to the houses Isa had chosen to look at.

The first house was nothing special, it was small for Radiant Garden, far away from the main hub of life. It was furnished, so they had to keep Balsam on his leash to avoid ruining things that might not become theirs. Isa loved it, but Lea hated the idea of not having more space when they had a dog and enough friends to populate a small world. Isa eventually agreed that the small house just wouldn’t work out, no matter how comfortable it was to stand inside. 

The next home was bigger, completely barren, and closer to the town they were familiar with. Technically not a stone’s throw from houses that were originally good with the upkeep, but Isa could easily make it one. After Lea double checked the doors to make sure they were all closed, Isa took the leash off of Balsam’s harness and let him roll around on the floor, quickly attracting Ienzo’s attention again.

Isa walked to stand next to Lea, leaning against the taller man with a smile on his face. “Is there any point to looking at the other places?”

“I mean, yeah? But not extensively… We both know we’re just gonna love this one, don’t we?” Lea was never sure what to do when Isa was initiating the affection, so he just stood there until Isa sighed and moved Lea’s arm back with his shoulder. They were back to being able to communicate silently, Lea knew exactly what that meant, he did it to Isa every single day. Wrapping his arm around Isa and placing his hand on the other man’s waist was more than comfortable. He was happy. They were starting their own life that didn’t include going through hell.

Isa continued to watch Ienzo play with the dog then looked up at Lea, smiling gently. “Think this can be home?”

“You know anywhere can be home when I know I’m with you,” Lea spoke quietly while meeting Isa’s gaze. “We just gotta know.”

Isa nodded and leaned to kiss Lea gently before turning back to look at their friend, the youngest that called Radiant Garden home, play with their puppy. Balsam was getting big, Ienzo was getting comfortable, and they were finding home.


	17. Chapter 17

Moving with access to two other houses to live in during the process could’ve been far more comfortable, but Lea insisted that they should just move in right away. Bring whatever they could in boxes that day and fall asleep on the floor with an excitable and confused dog.

It wasn’t exactly Lea’s most comfortable idea, but sitting on the floor with an open pizza box and fighting to keep the dog away from it while laughing was a gentle kind of comfortable. Lea with his phone out and Isa physically wrestling a pizza slice away from Balsam was a scene that anyone would smile at.

“Get that— No! Balsam, get that out of your mouth. Onions are bad for dogs.”

“Told you we shouldn’t have gotten onions on the pizza!” Lea couldn’t stop laughing, his breathing was ragged and his sides hurt as he watched Isa wrestling an entire pizza slice out of Balsam’s mouth.

“That is absolutely not the problem, Lea. The problem is we don’t have a table in the house yet and we ordered pizza and I wanted onions.”

“It’s the moving experience! C’mon, we’re gonna have coffee out of bowls tomorrow and it’ll be fun.”

“Lea, if Balsam manages to eat this and thinks he can get away with it later, I’m going to kill you.”

Lea snorted and opened the pizza box carefully, watching Balsam move his head towards the sound immediately, dropping the pizza slice so he could lunge for the pizza box just as it closed against his nose. Lea grinned a triumphant grin while Isa picked up the soggy pizza slice, shoving it into a bag they’d brought along for garbage. 

Isa, now without a dog in his arms, smiled. Lea didn’t get to see it for long because Isa immediately grabbed Balsam again and buried his face in the dog’s fur. Muffled laughing could be heard from Isa as Balsam began to whine and wiggle, wanting to be free for more attempts at pizza theft. 

Lea joined in on the laughing, shaking his head. “So, was I right? Is this fun? Having the moving experience is fun?”

“I’m not responding to your question, Lea. I have a dog in my face.”

“The dog has your face on him.”

“I suppose he does.” Isa looked up from the dog and sighed, content smile on his face. “You’re obnoxious.”

“I missed hearing the fondness in those words,” Lea moved over to sit directly next to Isa and Balsam, kissing Isa’s cheek and scratching at Balsam’s head. “I’m only as obnoxious as you are rude to me.”

“I’m only rude to you when you’re being obnoxious. Or when you were obnoxious when it’d be bad to be rude to you, like when we’re in public and trying to make a good impression.”

“Like when?”

“When we were trying to get picked up as apprentices is one time I can think of. Oh, when we were trying to reintroduce me to Kairi, you were being horrible when I was trying to apologize for what I, personally, put her through,” Isa said, shoving gently at Lea’s shoulder then resting against it. “I felt bad, but you wouldn’t let me. It was horrible, you’re a horrible friend.”

“That was one of the first times I got you to smile after I got you back, wasn’t it?”

“I smiled when I saw your face the moment I woke up. How long did you wait for me? I wasn’t told.”

“Oh, you woke up right away. I think it took a few hours at most. Most of the damage you got was from Roxas and his light attacks. I’m not sure any of my attacks towards the end even hit. I don’t think you can get hurt when you’re in the middle of starting that whole thing, can you?”

“Not that I’m aware of, though, I’m not aware of much when I’m in that state. It’s not really me, especially during that last fight. I was further gone than I’d planned on being.” Isa sighed and took his hand away from the dog’s fur, moving it so he could fully snuggle up against Lea. “It was scary a lot of the time. I don’t want to talk about it much, but with power came… great horror. I thought every time that I would finally just lose myself. Then the final battle came about and all of us were more formidable, not through training, but through additional giving ourselves away. Xion was saved from that only because she was able to take from me enough that it wasn’t necessary to have her become a darkness in… other ways.”

Lea sighed and ran his fingers through Isa’s hair. “Hey, we don’t need to talk about things you don’t want to talk about. We’re fine to just… sit here with our dog in our new house. We can be happy for a while. Get ready for rougher things later, yeah? I don’t think checking our old houses for our parents every night’s gonna be easy on us.”

“That’s… Yes, that’s why I…” Isa tightened in on himself more. “Never mind, it’s fine.”

Lea took in a breath. “I’m not saying we can’t talk about it now, just that you don’t have to. It’s like you putting the tears on my face are commanding me to stop crying, it’s just… reminding me that you’re there for me. That I can.”

Isa nodded, moving his hand to grab onto Lea’s shirt instead of leaving it curled against his chest. It took him a few minutes to speak again, letting Balsam slide between him and Lea. Collected into himself again, he took in a deep breath. “I had enough darkness in my heart to be counted among the chosen.”

“Wasn’t that your plan?”

“Yes, but it worked.” 

Lea could feel Isa’s hand shaking as he tried to keep holding onto his shirt. The dejection in his voice stung, hearing Isa’s heart break again was too painful. “You’re not actually full of darkness, Isa. You’re a good person.”

“Only I am. I have more than the man who used to experiment on people, Lea. Yes, that was the plan, it was exactly the plan, but he…” Isa’s voice was breaking in a way Lea hadn’t heard in years. Perhaps ever, perhaps the memory of hearing Isa like this was his mind reassuring Lea that his friend wasn’t broken beyond repair, that surely this had happened before. “I let myself fall. I leaned into it. I leaned so far into it that I’m not sure I’ve come back all the way.”

Lea held his breath as he realized now was a time to not say anything. He just held Isa as he felt the other man’s chest heaving. Gentle touches to let Isa know he was still there would hopefully be enough to help Isa come back. Falling apart was never fun, especially when things were going right. Lea was slowly learning to recognize that being broken wouldn’t always feel permanent, but it… probably was.

Isa cried for so long that Balsam walked away, sitting at the door patiently like he’d been taught to do when he wanted to leave a building. They couldn’t get up, he’d have to wait. Isa clung to Lea’s shirt for so long that the Radiant sun began to set, something Lea had hoped would be exciting to see for the first time in their new house. Isa’s breathing returning to normal took a few minutes more than the sun took to set. When he sounded like he was back in control, he wrapped his arms entirely around Lea. 

“Sorry. It just all hit me again,” Isa mumbled against Lea’s chest. “It all hit me. That I’m not worthy of all of this. That coming back twice was far more than I deserved.”

“Hey. Hey, no. That’s not true at all and I’m not gonna let you say it.” Lea’s words were firm, his opinion on the matter unbending. “I was gonna just let you cry it out, but I can’t let you think I agree with that. You deserve everything that’s happened since you came back. You risked yourself for everyone, all worlds. Literally everyone that exists. You risked your life again when you organized a coup. I’m never sure what any of those assholes, Xemnas and all the rest of them, would do, but we’ve seen people punished before. Hell, even back in the original Organization, you were sticking out your neck more than anyone. Nothing you did was darkness for evil’s sake. I… caused plenty of your darkness and I’m sorry. We’d been able to talk without words for so long, but you just weren't understanding and I never… bothered to try. I know I’m talking a lot, but I need you to realize that you feel bad about things that you caused and it wasn’t entirely on you. We fell apart for a while.” Lea adjusted his hold on Isa, burying his fingers and face in the other man’s hair. “I would’ve come back to you if I could have, Isa. If I wasn’t kicked out. I still loved you, leaving you alone on purpose was never my play. I didn’t get Roxas, I didn’t get to try again. I was still mad, but I would’ve tried. I wanted to save her as much as you did and I… wanted to save you. Once I realized how… bad it was. I was so fucking selfish as Axel, I’m still selfish, I’m making this about me without meaning to, but…

“But I love you. So much. You’re more light than I’ve ever been. You hide it real well, but… It’s all you.”

Lea’s words were heard, but Isa couldn’t manage a proper response to them. They sat in near-silence, Balsam’s whining and chattering had grown in volume, but there was nothing either of them could really do about it. 

Isa eventually fell asleep against Lea’s chest, leaving Lea to carefully lay the other man on the floor, making sure to not wake him. He was lucky Isa was such a sound sleeper because, despite getting him moved away from his chest and nearly on the floor, his hands slipped and he dropped Isa. All that greeted Lea’s mistake was a noise from Isa and a small adjustment of how he was laying.

Lea got up and put Balsam’s harness on, hushing him as nails hit the floor and excited barks tried to communicate just how badly he had to go outside.

It was a long walk, exercise for Balsam and a way to clear Lea’s head. He stopped briefly to talk to Yuffie, one of the people who made an appearance every time Balsam was taken out for a walk. By the time Lea returned home, it was the dead of night and Isa was still on the floor.

Lea knelt down next to Isa, looking at the visibly uncomfortable sleeping man. Sighing, Lea pushed hair out of Isa’s face. And of course the most gentle and careful motion was what woke Isa up. 

“Sorry, Isa. Go back to sl-” Lea couldn’t finish his sentence before Isa interrupted him as though he hadn’t heard Lea at all.

“Are you ready to find them?” Isa asked, propping himself up on his elbow and rubbing at his eyes with his other hand, yawning immediately after words escaped his lips. He moved to lean on Lea’s legs, closing his eyes. It was almost as if he’d forgotten the breakdown.

“Yeah, I think I am,” Lea said, nodding, confused by the sudden question. “But that’s not what’s important right now. Are you?”

“I will be soon enough. We should start tomorrow.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next chapter SHOULD be posted on 7/20. It's going to be another heavy chapter and I want it to be perfect because it's also a real Start to the search for their parents. 
> 
> Keep an eye out on my account for other fics, though! I have plans to start an AU fic where Isa runs a small shop and he and Lea are both single parents. It's gonna be cute :)


	18. Chapter 18

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Art in fic done by [Jeredu](https://twitter.com/JereduLevenin/) on twitter.

“You two will be exploring any towns you can to see if there are any signs of the lesser nobodies in them. Roxas, you’ll begin in Twilight Town. Xion, Radiant Garden. Keep tabs on each other so you don’t overlap. Report back to us if you see anything, do not engage. This is no more than recon and it is not Lea’s style of recon. Take potions with you just in case,” Isa had plans formulated to track down as many lesser nobodies as possible with the limited number of people they had. Since it was Lea’s idea, he couldn’t stop Lea from bringing the kids on. Still, having to tell them what to do made him uncomfortable and he feared it was visible on his face.

Roxas and Xion didn’t seem to notice, which Isa was grateful for. The two teens mocked Lea briefly then saluted Isa, grinning and leaving with their keyblades the way Ventus had taught them.

Lea waited a few feet away with two coats draped over his arm. The clothes they had were resistant to the dark, but it was comfortable wearing what they knew would work. The discomfort of wearing the coats couldn’t compare to the comfort in knowing they were safe. 

Sliding the coats on together kept them from feeling like they were getting away from themselves. That’s what they’d agreed on. They’d agreed on it before, they’d never agree on it again. 

“Ready to go, Isa?”

Isa reached over and adjusted Lea’s coat slightly before nodding. “As I’ll ever be, I suppose. Are you ready?”

“Well, now that you’ve got my coat taken care of,” Lea said with a laugh, reaching up to play with Isa’s jacket. Isa had his on properly, but that didn’t mean that Lea couldn’t unzip it slightly and pretend it had been that way the entire time. He zipped it right back up and smiled, gloved hands resting on Isa’s chest. “And your coat is set too.”

“It’s been fine, but whatever you say, Lea,” Isa sighed and shook his head. The lack of a visual sign that Isa thought he was being stupid concerned Lea. Isa lifted his hand and summoned a dark corridor. Lea sighed; he’d wanted to learn how to use the keyblades to get around like Ven had been able to do, but Isa was still so shaky with the weapon that Lea hadn’t even suggested that mode of transportation.

Lea tried to grab for Isa’s hand so they could walk through the portal together, like the first time they’d gone through one, but Isa pushed Lea’s hand away. It didn’t stop Lea from trying again, though, this time grabbing Isa’s hand.

“Lea, I shouldn’t have to tell you that I’m not in the mood. We’re going somewhere to do things that neither of us really wants to do. We’re putting people in states that may require medical attention. They may not wake up again, even if they’re back to being themselves. We don’t know how much luck has been on our side so far.” Isa’s voice was harsh, but Lea knew what he was saying was the truth. 

Their walk through the corridor was silent and fast. They entered the World through the castle, Lea still trying to hold Isa’s hand despite him not holding back. The moment they exited the corridor, Isa reached down to make sure his coat was completely zipped up. It seemed like an anxious fidget more than anything, his hand lingering.

Lea watched Isa’s already tense shoulders get even tighter as he walked towards the window, standing to look out to the empty sky. Lea leaned against the back of one of the seats, watching Isa’s hand move to clutch at the fabric laying over his heart. Maybe staying in the castle wasn’t the best idea.

“Are we gonna sit around and stare at the empty sky for hours or are we gonna get this party started?”

Irritation manifested instantly on Isa’s face, an eye twitched and his lips flattened into a thin line as he held back from snapping. “Lea, you need to get serious while we’re here, stop joking around and focus on the task at hand. You want this as much as I do, don’t you? We’re looking for our parents, not just mine, shouldn’t you be able to focus too?”

“Yes, sir. Whatever you say, sir,” Lea said with a wave of his hand.

Something seemed to snap in the air between them. Isa’s already incredibly tense form began to curl in on itself, arms folded in front of him and head slowly going down. It looked like he was about to sink to the floor in some kind of fetal position if he wasn’t stopped.

“Isa, hey, what’s wrong?” Lea reached out and touched Isa’s shoulder, wanting to offer a form of grounding. It worked before, bringing Isa back to the present with a touch, maybe it could work again. “You wanna go h-”

“Silence!” Isa shoved Lea’s arm away, his scar splitting open as he growled.

  

It wasn’t often that Isa actually used magic. He really wasn’t very good at most forms of it. Lea had certainly never felt it used against him. There were times where his own anxiety made his tongue feel heavy in his mouth, leaving him unable to speak, but this was somehow worse. Maybe it was the knowledge that Isa was doing this, maybe it was just how silencing felt, he wasn’t sure.

Fingers went to his lips, trying to calm himself and force the fear off his face. He’d had this happen plenty of times when up against heartless, but having this here, against Isa? He was terrified. He felt hope he’d found for the future slipping from his mouth in the place of words.

They stood together, eyes locked.

Isa looked away from Lea, wincing at what he’d done. Still, the silenced man tried to reach up and wipe the blood off of his friend’s face, forcing himself to move to comfort the other. He knew Isa rarely reacted violently… to anything, really. The growl in his voice likely would’ve shocked Lea into silence even if it had been something completely different, something non-magical. Lea was shoved away once more. 

He waited. 

The spell wore off and Lea tried once more to comfort Isa, placing his hand on Isa’s shoulder and squeezing it gently while speaking gently, “It’s okay, Isa. We’re okay.” 

He was again shoved away, Isa’s voice repeating the spell, in a somehow harsher tone. Panic stole Lea’s ability to process what noises were around them just as Isa had stolen his ability to make them. Twice. 

Lea stared at his hand, the one that had been shoved away, then up at Isa, too shaken to even tear up over this. Something in his very core was being crushed, was that his heart? It had to be. A sharp pain in his chest that he recognized as his heart being torn and taken. It scared him. Isa was scaring him. 

Sinking to the floor shaking, Isa watched as Lea slowly backed away. Neither of them sure why it was happening, why anything was happening. He was finally really a monster, wasn’t he? Hurting Lea was unforgivable. He’d never done it before… never. He couldn’t. He was broken. He was finally really, truly done. They had their go, Isa felt his heart shattering as he looked at Lea’s face while feeling blood sliding down his own. 

Isa curled in on himself, hiding his face against his knees and wishing he could silence his own sobs. That would have been a much better thing to have just happened. 

Dusks walked past, completely ignoring both of the men. Their feet dragged on the floor in a familiar way and Lea stared at his gloved hands. They couldn’t look at each other. Moving to comfort one another wasn’t an option, no matter how much they both wanted to. 

Lea couldn’t even look at Isa. The spell must have been too potent, he felt as if he couldn’t speak even after the time passed where he should have been able to. His tongue was heavy and his eyes were burning. Finally, tears began to slide down his face soundlessly. He could feel each one way too clearly against his skin. It was all too much. Looking at Isa again wasn’t an option, he couldn’t move his face to look up even if he wanted to. 

Lea continued to slowly back away, hearing distorted sobs. Distorted everything. His hands shook as he backed up right into something that moved upon contact, weird noise following the movement. Lea turned around, vision blurry, and expected to see a nobody or a piece of furniture he didn’t remember. Instead, green eyes met his and a small hand reached up. His hand was brought down slowly. 

“It’s okay, Lea,” the young, soft voice said as a gentle, small hand rubbed over his gloved one. “You’re not alone.” 

He’d forgotten her eyes were green now. When had that happened? Why? He hadn’t bothered questioning it. Her voice was calming, though, soft and kind. 

The girl moved past Lea, towards Isa. 

Lea backed into a dark corridor as she knelt next to Isa, reaching to take his hand, only to be shoved away just as Lea had been. Xion didn’t back down. She reached for his hand again, stumbling backwards as she was shoved at again. She tried once more, anger boiling to the surface of Isa’s face again. 

Blood had already left trails, following along where tears had fallen. He managed to keep from uttering the spell that threatened to spill from his lips once more, though it wouldn’t do much. Xion hadn’t spoken a single word to him yet. She just kept trying to take his hand and letting herself get shoved away. It would have been difficult to watch if Lea hadn’t already left. 

Isa shoved Xion backwards once more, curling down and letting out a scream. He didn’t want to yell at her, he didn’t want to hurt her, he couldn’t stop not seeing her. It felt overlayed with her real face. Isa couldn’t see her, he couldn’t. It didn’t make sense. He knew her face, it was her real face, her real heart. Was he really so horrible that he could lose that again? 

“It’s alright,” Xion said, her voice distorted in Isa’s mind. He didn’t want her to talk, he didn’t want to hear her in Xion’s voice again. He couldn’t do it. She wasn’t there, he was just hearing things. 

Again, anger built up inside him only to explode out in a rage, “Silence!” 

“It’s okay,” Xion’s voice sounded again, spell falling flat against her. 

“Silence,” Isa said in another attempt to not have to hear his mistakes weighing against him in the voice of a child. She embodied everything he’d failed to protect, failed to do. Why she loved him after all he’d done, he’d never know. She cared about him too much for all he’d done to her. She’d been hurt by him since the moment she began and still, she was trying to comfort him. 

“It’s okay, Isa,” she spoke again, unfazed by his most recent attempt at a spell. 

“Silence…” Request more than spell, Isa’s words were losing anger, but growing in desperation. Something about her voice was different than expected when she spoke his name. There was a heavier drop to the last syllable, but only under her voice. It was getting to be too much, too much. 

She reached forward and under the collar of his coat, running her fingers along it to pull hidden chain out. She smiled when he looked up at her, eyes soft with tears. She let go of Isa’s necklace, taking his hands and bringing them to rest on the pendant. 

“You have him with you all the time in your heart, even when you push him away.” Her voice was soft, becoming more her own again. He could no longer hear Her voice, but Xion’s voice was still layered and disorienting. It was still a direct knife into his heart. He’d lost his temper, something he’d thought he’d had a handle on. He had a handle on. 

He hadn’t lashed out like that the entire time he was forcing himself to play along with the man who had hurt and taken away his friend. He hadn’t lashed out when he realized he was without his heart again, that he may very well never get it back. He hadn’t lashed out. He didn’t know why he did this time. He’d been there before, it wasn’t new. 

Xion wrapped her hands around his and kept them from falling to his sides. “Things are hard now, hearts hurt.” Her words remained gentle, the remaining voice overlayed in hers seemed to be melting away as she continued. “You’ve known that longer than I’ve been alive, though, and you wanted it back the entire time. All the pain comes with love, doesn’t it? But it can be better, you can let it be better. I think you know how to help yourself move on, don’t you?” 

Isa took in a deep breath, steeling himself for what he felt coming. He could feel his rage boiling up again, his urge to scream and yell and throw things. He rarely let himself do that, he kept shoving it down and shoving it down and shoving it down. 

And Xion was there, acting like it was some kind of necessary. Maybe she would know, she had always seemed more volatile than any of the other soft-hearted children. She was probably right. 

He used his one last moment of control to gently move Xion back, she let him this time. She stepped back to put more distance between the two of them, the connection between the two of them telling her exactly what he would do. 

He let out a heart wrenching scream, curling in on himself and shaking as he began to sob. Blood mingled with tears again, his guilt swam to the surface to try to pull him under again, but Xion returned and wrapped her arms around him. She herself was breathing raggedly, as if she’d been crying. 

Isa didn’t want to know, but, still, he asked, “Are you okay?” 

Xion didn’t respond, arms tightening around him instead. 

“Xion, how did you know that I… would be hurting like this? What in the way I was gave it away that Lea wouldn’t be able to handle it?” 

“Nothing gave that away,” she mumbled, hiding her face from him. “I just wanted to make sure you were okay. I realized where you were going and… saw how you looked and realized you’d be in a difficult place. I want all my family to be okay.” 

“I’m sorry.” The brokenness in their voices echoed each other, making the cracks seem more stable, the hurt felt less all-consuming. 

“For being sad?” 

“For everything I did to you, Xion.” 

“You’ve already apologized.” Her voice danced beneath her tears, shaking her head and turning her knuckles white with her grip on Isa’s coat. “I don’t want you to keep apologizing when you’ve done so much to fix it.” 

“Xion, I still-” 

She cut him off instantly, “You were hurt too. You’ve explained yourself. I’m all for talking, but sometimes… it’s just you needing to move on. I forgive you, Isa.” 

“For hurting you?” 

“Lea did too.” 

“For calling you a thing?” 

“Everyone did.” 

“For saying you shouldn’t have been made?” 

It took her a moment longer, a moment where she buried her face deeper in the hug. “Do you think that now?” 

Isa hesitated as well, then placed his hand on the back of the girl’s head. “Of course not. You’re my family now.” 

“You’re not a monster, Isa, I promise. No more than a formerly faceless puppet is.” 

Xion finally loosened her grip and Isa followed suit, letting the girl move back so they could look at each other. She held out her hand. 

“Please, I’ll take you home.” 

Isa reached out, ready to agree, before looking around near-frantic. “Lea? Did he…?” 

“He left, yeah,” Xion said quietly. “But… isn’t the best way to make things okay to not ignore them?” 

Isa rolled his eyes and wiped tears out from under his eyes, blood smearing and making him look all the worse. It was sticky. He sighed and took the girl’s hand. “You shouldn’t be as wise as you are. It’s never good to be young and wise.” 

Xion smiled. “I’m just glad I’m not alone.” 

They return through the dark corridor, neither of them sure how safe two people on one keyblade glider would be. It’s a straight shot into the living room of Lea and Isa’s home. Xion leaves out the door instantly, giving them the privacy they needed. 

Lea had a moment of fear flash over his face, but he quickly shoved it aside as he got up. He took Isa’s hand and pulled him to the couch. “Sit.” 

Isa listened. 

Lea walked away. 

He returned quickly, despite Isa’s worry, warm washcloth in hand. Silence continued to fill the room as Lea sat next to Isa, but it wasn’t the forced kind, it was somehow soft. Lea took the washcloth to Isa’s face, cleaning the blood that had been smeared on and gently running it over the scar. It was comforting. 

“I don’t like that this opened up again, Isa.” Lea’s voice was calmer than his earlier face would’ve hinted at being possible. “I’m glad you’re home.” 

Isa nodded, tearing up again. He wasn’t the crybaby, but he couldn’t stop them. He… wasn’t going to try anymore. 

Startled, Lea wiped away a tear with his thumb, leaving his hand cupping Isa’s face afterwards. “Isa, are you okay? Are you still…” 

“No, Lea. Thank you.” He leaned forward, letting his head rest against Lea’s shoulder. 

“Tap out next time you’re getting… overwhelmed, okay? Can you promise me that?” 

“I promise,” Isa’s words were sincere, soft in comparison to his earlier words, the words before the spells had taken root. “We’ll get past things. Finally let them go.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry it took so long to post this chapter! I may be taking a small break from attempts at weekly posts,

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for the comments and kudos, guys! I really appreciate it. I’m gonna keep this going as long as I can. The comments and continued hits and kudos really help.


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